Posted originally on the Archive_of_Our_Own at https://archiveofourown.org/
works/522088.
  Rating:
      Explicit
  Archive Warning:
      Major_Character_Death, Underage, Rape/Non-Con
  Category:
      Gen, Other
  Fandom:
      Captain_America;_the_First_Avenger_(2011), The_Avengers_(2012), Iron_Man_
      (Movies)
  Relationship:
      James_"Bucky"_Barnes/Steve_Rogers, Steve_Rogers/Tony_Stark, Clint_Barton/
      Natasha_Romanov
  Character:
      Steve_Rogers, Tony_Stark, James_"Bucky"_Barnes, Thor_(Marvel), Loki_
      (Marvel), Howard_Stark, Peggy_Carter, Nick_Fury, Abraham_Erskine, Natasha
      Romanova
  Additional Tags:
      Alpha/Beta/Omega_Dynamics, Omega_Verse, First_Time, Knotting, Mating
      Cycles/In_Heat, Mutual_Masturbation, Self-Lubrication, Alpha_Males,
      Possessive_Behavior, Friendship, World_War_II, Canonical_Character_Death,
      Canon_Related, Spoilers, Scenting, Alternate_Universe, AU, Alternate
      Universe_-_Canon_Divergence, Canon-Typical_Violence
  Stats:
      Published: 2012-09-26 Completed: 2016-07-17 Chapters: 15/15 Words: 66539
****** Lover, War is Done (in More Ways than just One) ******
by Lispet
Summary
     In a world where people are required to submit to others because of
     the way they were born, there are exceptions to the rule. Aren't
     there always?
     Steve Rogers, Alpha. Everyone thinks he's Omega due to his size and
     temperament, until Project Rebirth. Cue in a seventy year jump and
     the return of an unrequited Bond mate, and maybe this century's too
     much.
     And as they say, compassion is the measure of a man.
     incomplete and will never be finished. any eager writer is welcome to
     try their hand at finishing it
Notes
     This is an AU where humans descended from canines, not primates. So
     yes, they have ears and tails similar to dogs, their sense of smell
     is slightly advanced, their hearing is better too, and yes, they are
     ALL partially colour blind and have tails and their canine teeth are
     more prominent and sharper, and stuff and random fact! Dogs rarely
     get cavities with a proper diet, so people in this story won't get
     cavities often, providing they are healthy (cough Steve cough).
     Except Tony Stark. But they said he couldn't build JARVIS, and he
     did...
     Some things in this AU that normally are quite wrong for humans to do
     are perfectly acceptable in this world, this includes petting hair,
     touching ears with normal people, licking and even touching genitals
     (usually through clothes) in friends and relatives. It’s dog
     behaviour. They are descended from wolves so just shh and read the
     story.
     I hope you enjoy it!
     And yes I start writing more of this and then feel the need to
     explain myself even more so you have the longest notes section ever.
***** It all begins somewhere *****
Steve didn’t hate society, and the forced roles that went with it. He didn’t
hate himself, or his parents, or genetics, which would ensure that he was
almost guaranteed to be submissive, weak, pathetic, and he didn’t hate the
people who took it upon themselves to point this out to him at every turn in
life—his alcoholic father, the kids on his street who would never let him play
cricket with them, the people at school, minus Bucky of course—no, the only
thing he really hated about all of this was that he couldn’t force himself to
stand down to a stronger, more dominant Alpha-male when he had to, when he knew
that if he didn’t, he’s have to walk home with a bloodied nose and a limp.
He didn’t choose the genetics that almost guaranteed him to be an Omega, not
that that was confirmed yet anyway, he still had puberty to consider, until
then, everyone was Omega, inferior, but it was usually easy to tell who would
turn out on top.
The only person he knew that didn’t push him around for the hell of it was his
child-hood friend, James Barnes. Well, everyone just called him Bucky.
Bucky hit an early puberty at thirteen, and for Steve, it was almost painful to
watch his friend’s growth spurt, the change in his maturity, (the maturity bit
was a little easier. Steve had always been rather sensible even as a child and
early teen, so it was more of Bucky catching up to him in that manner), and the
worst part, Bucky’s altered role in society.
No longer a child-Omega, Bucky stood in a position of power, at least until
everyone else caught up with him. He was treated differently by, and acted
differently around adults. They didn’t shelter him anymore; they didn’t really
need to. Along with his growth spurt, his glands grew, or refined, giving him
the hearing, smell, and taste of an adult, he could tell now, without having to
overhear, or be told, who was Alpha, Beta, or Omega. He just knew.
Even as a Beta, Bucky got a little twitchy when an Omega in Senior Year was
going into, or out of, a heat. Omegas were banned from school whilst on their
heat. It was physically dangerous—Alphas became very aggressive when an Omega
went on heat, and they didn’t make much distinction between Alpha and Beta.
However even after his change, Bucky didn’t treat him any differently. Bucky
just stayed Bucky. That was an advantage of someone being a Beta. They weren’t
as driven by hormones and pheromones and the need to mate, they remained more
neutral, more open and less instinct driven.
Nevertheless, Bucky was always there to patch him up when he got his nose
punched in.
Like right now.
“You know, you’ve been doing this for nearly eighteen years now Steve.” Bucky
reached down, leaning on the bricks for balance, “I thought you’d have learnt
by now.”
Steve frowned, and looked away, at the ground to check that he hadn’t dropped
anything. “I can’t just back down to them though! It just doesn’t feel right.”
Steve sighed, and carefully poked his nose. It wasn’t bleeding, that was a
start. “I mean I’m the only Omega they’ve ever pushed around like this. Aren’t
they supposed to be, y’know, nice?”
Bucky laughed, and wrapped his arm around Steve’s shoulder, patting firmly.
“It’s just because you’re the only child-Omega left. Once you’re fertile,
they’ll never look at you the same. And who knows? You might fill out a little
whilst you’re at it!”
Steve poked Bucky in the ribs for that, and Bucky just laughed again.
Bucky steered him to the bathroom, where Steve could lean against the metal
trough and clean himself up in the mirror before they went to class.
“You sure you’re going to be fine?” Bucky had to ask, he and Steve were in
different years, Steve the year above, which made Bucky’s early puberty really
unfair, y’know, because Steve was nearly two years older than him.
“Yeah, I think we’re watching a film.” Steve used the hem of his shirt to wipe
the last drops of water from his face.
“Which one?” Bucky was lounging against the brickwork by the door, patiently
waiting for his friend.
“Some of the Great War propaganda I think.” Steve shuddered. The war was past,
so why show them any of the footage? It was pointless and quite disturbing,
violent, but the others seemed to be perfectly fine with it. Perhaps it was the
Omega in him talking, which was exactly why Omegas weren’t supposed to become
soldiers. They were too soft, too emotional and susceptible to any Alpha who
gave an order, turning them into potential hazards for their own team. Well,
with use of suppressants, Omegas still managed to get into the military—they
needed the numbers, not every Beta and Alpha was fit for, or wanted to go to
battle, and Omegas lived to serve.
Betas made good soldiers, they were immune to pheromones, but had a part of the
drive of an Omega—that they wanted to please their Alpha, their commanding
officer, but they could keep their heads when they went into battle, they
didn’t go into heat, they weren’t susceptible to any Alpha they weren’t
familiar with.
Naturally, Alphas were the leaders; they were inherently built for it, all
muscle with the want to be superior to everyone else, aggressive, possessive
and strong.
No wonder Steve stood no chance when he attempted to resist the bullying.
“Sounds… fun.” Steve could hear the doubt in Bucky’s voice, and rolled his
eyes. “We’ve got like five minutes, and I don’t want to get in trouble with the
teacher. My ass is still sore from the last beating.” Bucky pushed himself off
the wall when Steve walked past him, out towards the main building.
“You punched an Alpha in the face.”
“He was going to break your ribs!”
“Wasn’t worth it.” Steve jumped up on a bench as they walked past so he was
taller than Bucky, and glared down at the Beta.
“Kept you safe.” Bucky grabbed Steve’s wrist and pulled, and Steve fell off the
bench as they walked. “Well, you’re seventeen, nearly eighteen now. You’ll
phase soon, there hasn’t been a person who hasn’t yet.”
“There’s always a first.” Steve pointed out. Steve ducked into the doorway of
the nearest room—his classroom. “See you later.”
Class went down pretty normally; Steve sat three rows back, managed not to die
via asthma when the teacher had him clean the duster for the blackboard, took
notes when he had to, bit his cheek to avoid snapping back at the Alphas who
kicked the back of his chair—he was too light for his weight to do anything,
and was squashed painfully between his chair and the edge of his desk. They did
watch the movie about the Great War, and Steve tried not to watch it too much,
instead going for scribbling on the edge of his notebook.
And then it hit him.
His throat closed over, similar to one of his asthma attacks, and he slumped
forwards a little, his fingers reaching out to grab something to pull him back
to earth—the edge of his desk—and he forced himself to breath in. He was
horribly aware that he probably looked ridiculous, gasping for air like a fish
out of water, his body twitching like it was a highly-strung wire, and someone
poked him in the shoulder.
He waved vaguely, I’m okay, and closed his eyes, counted to ten, breathed deep
and calm, he could and had dealt with an asthma attack without his drugs.
When his breathing fit subsided, he was also hyper-aware of everything, the kid
in the back row who was scrunching up a ball of paper, how bright and stark the
film was against the projector screen, the roughness of the wooden desk, which
had always felt so smooth before, under his fingers, and how heavy and
restricting his clothing felt, the metallic tang of excitement on his tongue,
and over all of that, the thick, heavy musky, slightly salty, overbearingly
sweet smell that suddenly filled the room, clogging up his sinuses, probably
what had bought his asthma on. His whole body reacted to the smell, and he felt
that he couldn’t move, that he was crowded, boxed into his chair not just by
the smell, but by pure carnal fear that something (bad) would happen to him if
he moved and acted on the impulses sent by his body.
He clenched his hands into fists until his nails dug into his palms against the
unbidden lust that swirled through him and tried to breathe through his mouth
as best he could, blocked the scents out, locked his brain on something that
had nothing to do with any of this at all. Like Bucky.
Oh God what he’d give for Bucky to be here to guide him through this. The first
heat for an Omega was always rough, he should’ve been prepare—
He choked on his next inhale when he gasped. What if this was his first heat?
Stuck in a stuffy classroom where he couldn’t do a thing, surrounded by Alphas
and Betas and the rest of the Omegas stuffed down the back of the room—he could
smell that they were Alphas, that was where the bulk of the musk smell was
coming from, the salt and sickly sweet from somewhere else, probably him—any
one of them could take advantage of him, control him, and he wouldn’t be able
to do a thing, forced to follow his Omega instincts, they could do anything,
and he would be compelled to submit, fall to his knees, spread his legs for
whoever wanted him because an Omega couldn’t, wasn’t allowed to, say ‘no’ to an
Alpha.
It could get them killed.
The smell was starting to get strong, way too strong for him, the musk and the
sweet clouding into his brain, aided in there by his sudden panic, and it
suddenly seemed very logical for him to bolt from the room, around the corner
to wind up somewhere, shaking and panting and nearly crying, because the smell
wasn’t going away so he had to be going into his first heat and now wasn’t the
time! And his whole body ached with the unfamiliar desire to rut against
something and when he looked up, he was standing outside a classroom, and he
didn’t hesitate to knock on the door when the numbers on the plaque became
coherent.
“Yes?” The teacher answered the door, Steve couldn’t help but blurt out
‘Bucky!’, before coming to his senses, taking in the strong, powerful smell of
the teacher—he was only a Beta, his scent was more neutral and it temporarily
overrode his heat and Steve could think clearly. Make up a lie.
“Sorry sir, Mr. Mayfield would like to speak to James Barnes please.”
The teacher took him in, took in his startled expression, the panic, the
heaving chest and the sweat beading on the skin of his brow and neck, and
probably Steve’s smell, and jerked a tiny nod, and opened the sliding door
further, stepping aside to show the class, previously working on mathematical
equations, but all of them were staring at the door, and the spectacle Steve
was making, several of them fidgeted, probably as affected by Steve’s odour as
he was, but only Bucky stood out to Steve, Bucky, who in a split second, went
from calm to as nearly panicked as Steve was, but the only visible appearance
was a slight pinch between his brows and eyes that darted around the room,
almost as if daring an Alpha to step up and even try to claim Steve. Bucky
could and would take them on for Steve, to preserve Steve’s honour and virtue.
Steve didn’t feel like crying anymore, but felt like crying more at the same
time.
“Thank you, sir.” Bucky said in passing to his teacher, ducking his head
submissively to the elder Beta. The door almost slammed shut behind Bucky’s
back, and Bucky grabbed Steve’s arm, dragging him away, out towards the oval at
the back of the school. “What happened?”
Steve couldn’t find the energy or will to resist Bucky, either physically or
mentally and let himself be hauled away, let his mouth run away from him,
telling Bucky everything, from the asthma attack right up until Bucky started
dragging him off, how he felt now, how he felt that he desperately needed
something, what he didn’t know yet.
Bucky finally stopped at the back of the shed that housed the school’s meager
supply of sports equipment, and put his hand on Steve’s shoulder, putting
pressure down, trying to force him to kneel. Steve didn’t think about it, his
knees just locked and he resisted bluntly, automatically, and his fingers
clenched into fists again.
“No.” Steve was shocked with how his voice came out, harsh and demanding, since
when had he spoken to Bucky like that?
“Steve, obey.” Bucky’s voice deepened a little, attained a little authority,
authority that made something inside Steve rear up and fight back, and Steve
unconsciously pushed Bucky’s hand off his shoulder. Bucky grabbed Steve’s upper
arms instead, one bicep in each hand, and pulled him to the dusty concrete
ground. “Just trying to help.” The brunette murmured, “I know it’s a little
frightening.”
Steve huffed a laugh, forced his body to relax when Bucky guided them both to
the earth, settled in Bucky’s lap when invited. “You’re telling me?”
Bucky grinned at him, and shifted so he was sitting with his back to the
corrugated iron shed, so Steve was straddling his thighs. “This less
intimidating?”
Steve only nodded, and didn’t think about much else, driven by a bone deep need
to get as close to warm soft flesh as possible, that warm flesh being his best
friend, he didn’t hesitate to think about consequences and what would happen
between them after this? Bucky couldn’t bond with an Omega, not in the way an
Alpha could, he just tugged at Bucky’s shirt, encouraging the Beta to strip it
off before pulling his own off, letting Bucky’s hands smooth across his skin,
his ribs, his narrow shoulders, just as his own hands greedily took in as much
of Bucky as they could, scraping the backs of his nails across Bucky’s chest,
the firm muscles, and the bones of his clavicles.
Bucky shivered under his touch, and Steve felt a little proud of himself,
before letting Bucky press a kiss to his mouth, insistent and warm and Steve
instantly craved more, even as his lungs screamed for oxygen against another
impeding asthma attack.
Eventually survival won out and Steve pulled away, sucking air into his weak
lungs and body, and he scraped his fingers through Bucky’s slightly coarse
hair, scratching his scalp slightly around the edges of his ears, and Bucky
leant into the caress, a slight noise on his lips.
The noise did something subtle to Steve, as did the slight, weak pheromones
Bucky was giving off, and Steve rocked his hips forwards and down, rubbing
their groins together insistently.
It didn’t take long to get them both off, not with hands pressing against
sensitive spots and glands the incited the release of more pheromones, and
Steve moaned Bucky’s name into the Beta’s shoulder when he came, and bit down
none too gently to muffle the most of his cry.
That seemed to be enough to send Bucky over the edge too, and the brunette
leant his head back against the shed, seemingly oblivious to the bruise Steve
had produced on his shoulder.
“Is that better?” Bucky asked when his harsh breaths had subsided.
Steve was still shuddering a little, his skin crawling in unusual ways, but he
nodded, trying to keep his lips against Bucky’s skin, breathing as deeply as he
could past the ever-threatening asthma, breathing in Bucky’s faint but
undeniably masculine scent. He felt a little lightheaded, but that could be
because his heart was still going a mile-a-minute.
“You right there?” was Bucky’s next question. Steve just swept his tongue over
the steadily blooming mark on Bucky’s skin, before leaning back a little to
inspect it, feeling slightly smug (for unknown reasons) of his handiwork. He
felt a smidgen uncomfortable, both he and Bucky had come in their pants, and it
was a little sticky and warm and Steve almost wanted to do it again.
Almost.
“What are you doing?” Bucky glanced down, lifted his hands to drag them through
Steve’s blonde locks, down his neck, to rest at the small of his back again.
“Not sure.” Steve hummed, slumping against Bucky. He felt stronger than he ever
had before and he wasn’t quite sure why, but it was a nice feeling, and he felt
that the feeling stemmed from Bucky, so he was just going to soak it all up
whilst he could.
“Steve.” Bucky twisted his head as much as he could to see what Steve had been
doing, licking his shoulder like that, not that it didn’t feel nice, the tip of
Steve’s tongue dancing across his skin, it was just unusual.
“Mmm?” Steve snuggled closer, closed his eyes, but the rest of his senses were
on full alert, or as full alert as one can be after orgasm, especially one of
the most potent orgasms he had even had.
“Why is there… did you mark me? Why would you…” Bucky fell silent, and he hands
tightened slightly on Steve’s waist. “Steve, you marked me.”
Steve glanced at the mark on Bucky’s skin again before resuming his comfortable
and warm position. “I guess I did.”
“Why did you mark me?”
“I’m not sure.” And he wasn’t. He also wasn’t quite 100% sure why he wasn’t
still a horny, sex craving mess right now. From what he had heard, the first
heat turned every Omega into a jumble of chaos and pheromones and want. Maybe
his weak body just didn’t allow it. That was possible. Malnutrition was one of
the know reasons an Omega might skip a heat, or the heat might not run its full
course. Something that produced so much stuff required a lot of energy. Much of
which Steve didn’t have. “It felt right.”
“Steve, Omegas don’t mark.” Bucky drew his hand up and rubbed his shoulder,
rubbed the mark thoughtfully, breathed deep through his nose, and then
chuckled. “Oh my God I’m an idiot.” His chuckle degenerated into a laugh, and
soon he was gasping for air, clutching uselessly at Steve for an anchor.
“Bucky.” Steve groaned a complaint. “This isn’t funny. I’m comfortable, I’m
going through my first heat, just stop laughing!” Steve grabbed Bucky’s waist
firmly, doing his best to hold his friend still.
Bucky calmed himself as best he could, tried to speak too. “Not…” Snigger. “Not
heat.” Bucky broke down into a state of near tears of mirth, and leant his head
back against the shed.
Steve only panicked more, and managed to complain in garbled whines.
Bucky closed his eyes, took a deep breath that nearly sent him into a fit of
giggles again, and grabbed Steve’s shoulders. He cracked his muddy brown eyes
open and looked Steve dead in the eye. “You’re not in heat.” He managed, as
seriously as he could. “You’re not even an Omega.”
“What?”
“You’re not an Omega.” Bucky repeated. “They’re all going to have a field day.”
He muttered that part. “Steve stop daydreaming, you amazing creature!” Bucky’s
arms closed around him tightly, almost painfully, and Bucky rested his cheek
against Steve’s shoulder. “You’re an Alpha! Oh this all makes sense now, why
you let yourself get beat up instead of running, why Omegas stare at us, Steve
you’re astounding!” Steve was puzzled, just a little. There was no chance that
he was an Alpha… was there? Bucky was moving, and a growl was snatched from his
throat before he could stop it. Why was Bucky moving? Was he trying to escape?
Why would he want to escape? Bucky was Steve’s. Bucky froze, and Steve’s jaw
dropped open in shock.
“I just… I’m so sorry, I don’t know why-”
Bucky clamped one hand over Steve’s mouth, and reached for his shirt with the
other. “You’re running on instincts. Just try not to snap at anyone else.
They’ll probably try to hurt you.”
Steve wanted to resist when Bucky put his shirt on, he wanted to stop Bucky
putting his own shirt on, finding the skin-skin contact rather addicting and
pleasant, but instead he leant down to press his lips to Bucky’s throat, took
in the weak Beta scent, and that quelled what lust was still swirling around in
him.
“I’m going to take you back to class, if you think you can handle it.”
“I can handle it.” Steve said trying to sound like he didn’t just come in his
pants five minutes ago.
Bucky led him to class after tucking his shirt into his pants properly, and
Steve started feeling a little apprehensive. What would his teacher do to him
for just bolting like that? And the crap he’d get from the guys in his class.
That would be just as bad, or worse than his punishment from the teacher. And
would they smell the difference in Steve now? No, any scent he let off, even
just after what he and Bucky had just done would be drowned out by the far
stronger, and ingrained scent of students from years past.
“You think you’re going to be alright?” Bucky squeezed Steve’s shoulder, pulled
him a little closer to the Beta’s body.
“Yeah, teacher will knock me around a little, but nothing I can’t take.” Steve
leant against Bucky, having felt a little weak in the knees since getting up to
go back to class.
“Need anything else?” Bucky asked, hand sliding away from Steve’s body. He
shifted a little, following the touch, the warmth. Bucky took the hint and
scraped both his hands through Steve’s hair, from hairline to the nape of
Steve’s neck, pausing at Steve's ears, rubbing them between forefinger and
thumb, Steve melted a little, and pulled the blonde close, into his arms and
Steve pressed his face into the slight crevasse between Bucky’s chest and arm,
where Bucky’s scent was the strongest, and pressed the palm of his hand against
Bucky’s left shoulder, where the mark was. Mine.
“Go on, scamp. Get to class before someone sees us.” Bucky gave Steve a small
push towards the door, and Steve opened it a crack.
“That’s not what you said before.” He commented with a smirk before slipping
back into his classroom. He trailed his fingers along the wall on the way back
to his seat, got tripped once, and received a stern glare from the teacher
saying that ‘he was staying back after class’. He just nodded and shrank into
his chair, trying not to think about the sickly sweet smell that was now
associated with this room. The smell was just the same as before, muted a bit
through Bucky’s neutral smell, but still enough to make his head swim, enough
to make him feel short of breath.
The bell rang, loud and sharp about twenty minutes later, and Steve packed his
things away, but waited for the teacher to approach him before leaving.
Sadly, the other Alphas in his class approached him before the teacher did.
“Aww, poor little Omega can’t handle the smell of another going into heat?” One
of them jeered, leaning on his shoulders. So that’s what a heat smelt like,
terribly sweet and a hint sweaty. He couldn’t fully understand what the others
liked about it. Steve stiffened and shifted when weight bore down on top of
him, feeling hedged in, unsafe, threatened. Bucky’s scent was fast fading from
him, easily drowned by the thick, musky Alpha smell the others carried.
Steve jerked his head, no, once.
“‘S alright though, he probably wouldn’t handle his own first heat much better.
Probably would hurl the moment he got the first cramp.” They all laughed, and
Steve fisted his hands in the hem of his shirt. Bucky got beaten for attaching
an Alpha, and everyone knew that he was a Beta. If Steve had a go at any of
these Alphas, when his teacher thought he was an Omega, well, Steve didn’t know
what would happen.
“Nah, wait a sec, he smells like Alpha.”
“So?”
“What if he’s had his heat and he’s mated?”
One of them laughed—the one leaning on his shoulders, and the guy pressed his
nose into Steve’s hair to smell. Steve very nearly snarled, ears already flat
against his skull. “Who would want to even try?”
Before any of them could say anything else, the teacher approached, and they
all scattered, leaving Steve shivering in rage in his chair. The teacher
squatted down in front of Steve’s desk, so he was eye-to-eye with the blonde.
“Is everything alright?” Mr. Mayfield, Steve’s teacher, was perhaps one of the
scariest men in the school. He was also insanely strong—strong enough to knock
around the misbehaving Alpha Seniors in Steve’s class, even though he was a
Beta. Steve admired him for it, but didn’t want to be on the receiving end of
his ruler.
“I just felt a little ill,” Steve lied, “and needed some fresh air.”
“First time’s always the worst.” Mayfield said suddenly, and Steve tensed a
little more. Was he actually going to get ‘the talk’ when he didn’t need it
anymore? “It wasn’t easy watching my sister go through her first heat.” Steve
blushed at Mayfield’s forwardness, and Mayfield rocked back on his heels. “What
I’m trying to say is if you need to take a few days off, just don’t come to
school, alright? You’ve pretty much earnt it with your grades any way.”
Mayfield stood. “Dismissed, Rogers.”
Steve bolted.
Bucky was waiting for him outside the room, and Steve nearly crashed into him.
“Well?”
“Mayfield tried giving me the talk.” Steve groaned. They both fell in step,
heading away from the school, towards Steve’s place. “I think I’d have rather
been hit over the knuckles.” Steve paused. “Maybe not, but he’s pretty much
given me permission to take the next, oh, week off if I need it.”
“What, he can’t smell the Alpha on you?”
“Apparently not,” Steve suddenly remembered the guys from class, “the guys in
class did though, and I nearly hit one of them when he smelt my hair.”
“Good thing you didn’t.” Bucky said. “You know we can have so much fun with
this, right?”
“One of them thought I mated. Oh God Bucky really who would mate with me?”
Bucky shrugged. “I would, but we can’t.”
Steve snorted, and then coughed, “Right, yeah, well uhh… thanks?” Bucky would
mate with him? Steve felt a sudden rush of everything, affection, joy,
possessiveness. But… “Why can’t we?”
Bucky stopped dead and stared at Steve. “Pull your head out of the ground! Last
male-Alpha-Beta pairing I heard about… well, it didn’t turn out pretty. It’s
just not allowed.”
“Why?” Okay, so Steve didn’t get the chance to get out much.
Bucky leant close to Steve, and glanced around. They could, despite this
apparent Alpha-Beta mating issue that really Steve thought was a load of bull,
be seen this close because honestly, Steve passed for a really crappy Omega at
the best of times. “There’s talk that the world’s headed for war again soon.
The government wants a larger population, so if the pairing can’t produce
superior offspring, it’s illegal.”
“That’s stupid!” Steve yelped. Bucky rolled his eyes. “I mean, if two people
imprint, then why stop them?”
“It doesn’t matter.” Bucky shrugged, apparently totally unconcerned by it.
“It’s not like we’re going to imprint or bond for that matter anyway. It
would’ve happened already.”
“Bucky, I only just found out what I was today. Is that really enough time to-”
“You just found out that you’re an Alpha, and then kidnapped me to jerk off. I
think you’d know.”
“But I marked you!”
“Instinct.” Bucky said quickly. “You’d’ve done it to anyone you care about.”
“Oh that list sums of you and you and oh, you. Because clearly mum doesn’t
count.”
“Doesn’t mean that we’ve imprinted.” Bucky ruffled Steve’s hair, and Steve
ducked away. “Well when the war comes I guess I’ll have to go.”
“Not without me you won’t.”
“Since when have you been interested in war?”
“I know I wouldn’t be able to force myself to sit by whilst every other guy I
grew up with lays his life on the line for his country. I’d do anything to
protect everyone here, because really, what do I have to offer to the gene
pool?”
“Nerdy-ness.” Bucky deadpanned.
Steve sniggered. “Try dorky-ness.”
The both burst into laughter.
“Better than what a lot of others have to offer.” Bucky finally said when they
stopped giggling. “We could use more people like you in this world.”
Originally, Steve thought Bucky was saying that to make him feel better.
***** Apologies *****
I'm so sorry everyone, this story's going to have to go on hiatus. I won't be
able to write any more for a while, I just won't be in a fit emotional state to
produce anything worth posting for a few weeks. That and I have exams.
You can stop reading now because the rest is just why I'm not going to be fit
to write, and it's pretty horrible, I just thought some of you might like to
know why I'm just not writing any more.
Seriously guys, stop reading, you don't need to cry.
So, my mare (horse) has been pregnant for the past eleven months, and she gave
birth to twins and they were stillborn, there wasn't really anything we
could've done. I'm waiting for the vet to show up now, to make sure that Maggie
(the mare) is all right, and that she's not bleeding internally or anything.
You don't need to feel sorry for me or anything, Really, you don't. And I
promise that I'll keep writing this story, you can just ignore all of this and
there'll be another chapter in a month or two. I'm so sorry I have to stop
writing. I know how much many of you are waiting patiently for the next
chapter, and I'm so sorry that you're getting this news instead of some more
Bucky/Steve PWP.
So just, don't bother commenting on this chapter or anything, I'll reply still,
but just feel sorry and don't say anything. I'll just imagine that you are sad
and we can be imagining sad through the interwebs together. Because it's
easier, and I'm wasting less of your time.
***** The real Chapter 2 *****
Chapter Notes
See the end of the chapter for notes
1941
When Steve’s mother died, he moved eighteen blocks down, and six to the left to
live with his grandma. It put him even further away from Bucky than he had
been, but they still kept in contact, very frequent contact, seeing as Bucky
didn’t exactly have a proper home, his dad having died of a tumour, and his mum
in a depressive funk, working the rest of the time, and so that left Bucky to
do exactly as he pleased.
Most of the time, whatever Bucky pleased was spending his time with Steve, and
it wasn’t uncommon for Steve, in college now, to wake up with Bucky’s arm cast
over the small of his back, pinning him to the sheets.
Steve didn’t mind a great deal. It gave him a good excuse to pull his pillow
over his head and sleep for another five minutes. But then he always had to
push himself out of bed, because he was in college now, first year Fine Arts
and it was so much better than high school, but so much worse, because every
other student in his class was a Beta or an Omega, and Bucky joked that he was
lucky, but they both knew better.
“Oh God Bucky,” Steve pressed his face into the crook of his elbow, and Bucky’s
hand tightened on his hip, enough to leave bruises, but everything was enough
to leave bruises.
Omegas were Steve’s downfall. They were a literal health hazard to him.
Three times a year, an Omega went on heat, unless they were on suppressants,
which were an inconvenience, and unreliable. The main purpose of this heat was
for an Omega to signal, mainly to an Alpha, when they could most easily
conceive. These signals ranged from pheromones to body language, and on the odd
occasion when both of these failed, spoken word was resorted to.
Unfortunately, Steve was an Alpha. Unfortunately, he was asthmatic, and his
asthma was easily incited by the pheromones of an Omega in heat. And it really,
really hurt to be mid-asthma attack, so he wasn’t that lucky to be the only
Alpha in his class.
“It’s all right Steve, I’ve got you.” Bucky’s voice was hot and heavy against
his ear, just as Bucky’s body was hot and heavy, pressed against Steve’s side,
helplessly rutting against him occasionally. Steve reached down and grabbed
Bucky’s hand, and pulled it to his mouth, sucking the fingers against his
tongue and pressing them to the roof of his mouth, taking care not to nick the
digits with his teeth. The pheromones were bad enough for him without them
being directly released into his mouth via blood.
Bucky’s other hand shifted from his hip and yanked his slacks down in response,
and Steve actually did bite Bucky’s fingers right then when the Beta gripped
Steve’s hard cock suddenly.
Bucky hissed in pain, and his fingers jerked out of Steve’s mouth, but not
before Steve’s tongue swiped across the small cuts, cleaning away the blood.
Steve moaned and tried to follow the saliva-blood-slicked hand, but he was just
too short to reach.
“Easy there.” Bucky pressed his lips to the inside of Steve’s ear, running his
tongue along the hairless interior carefully. “Just relax, I’ve got this.” He
tugged with his hand still wrapped around Steve’s length, gently, rubbing his
thumb over the tip. Bucky shuffled down then, teeth raking down the bumps of
his ribs, two sharp lines of not quite pain, before there was a tentative wet
prod along with Bucky’s fingers on his cock, and when he threw his head back
and keened, Bucky gained a little confidence and wrapped his lips around the
tip.
Steve reached down, pushed his fingers through the dark hair hovering over his
hips, and sought out Bucky’s ears, rubbing them between his fingers, and Bucky
hummed, and pulled off, his tongue licking a wet stripe up the underside of
Steve’s length. “You should walk around naked.” He was told, the sentence
punctuated by scraping teeth, gentle against his soft skin. “With a dick like
this, any Omega would throw themselves at you.”
Steve blushed crimson at that, the redness seeping down his shoulders, and
pulled Bucky’s hair sharply, the only response he got to that was a chuckle and
Bucky’s mouth back on his length a little more.
“Nngh, Bucky, Bucky stop.” When he felt his orgasm coming on, Steve pulled at
Bucky’s ear, and Bucky back off, his hand still working Steve firmly. Steve
gasped and shuddered when his release hit him, riding out the airless waves
almost silently, and everything swirled to black.
“Wow, jeez, way to freak a guy out.” Bucky’s nose was pressed into the
underside of his jaw when he came to, and Steve abashedly realised he had
passed out.
Screw. Asthma.
“Sorry.” Steve breathed. He watched his breath condense as white fog above him.
His fingers played on Bucky’s ear against his control, and Bucky squirmed a
little. “Did you…”
“Sorted myself out.” Bucky withdrew, and reached down for the blanket before
flopping on his stomach, still naked. Steve let his eyes wander down the
athletic back that remained uncovered. He reached out and traced a muscle, and
down the curve of Bucky’s spine, stopping just shy of the blankets.
“Thanks.” Steve rolled over, and tugged the sheets up to their shoulders. He
cast an arm over Bucky, fully aware that he should be getting up and getting
dressed or something. It was four in the afternoon for crying out loud!, but
couldn’t bring himself to. He propped himself up a little and shifted so he was
looming over the Beta a little, and Bucky gripped the pillow tightly when Steve
bent to bite at his shoulder, where the ever-present mark was.
Omegas might be his undoing, but Bucky would always be there to help him piece
himself back together.
Right?
Akdgjlqervhrgve THer'es supposed to be a bigger paragraph gap here but AO3's
HTML is being a jerk
1942
“You suck.” Steve pushed himself away from the wall when Bucky finally emerged
from the enrolment tent. It was the first time Steve applied, Bucky’s first
time too, Steve had been rejected the moment he walked into the tent. He could
smell the subtle shift of pheromones in the other recruits and the recruiting
officer—and burly Alpha who hardly took time to look at Steve, let alone smell
him—and once that had been confirmed, he was pretty much kicked out, and had to
resign himself to waiting for Bucky out in the cold.
Bucky had emerged nearly an hour later, grinning broadly, enrolment papers
clutched in his fist.
“Hey, now I don’t have to worry about you.” Bucky said, as if this was a silver
lining. Didn’t mean that Steve wouldn’t be worrying about Bucky.
“You’ll get shipped out and then what’ll I do when I’m about to get my front
teeth knocked out in a back alleyway?”
“You won’t get there in the first place.” They started walking to the nearest
pub, perhaps closer to each other than strictly necessary, Steve had serious
issues concerning his possessiveness of his only friend, and Bucky knew that
Steve, even after three years of knowing that he was capable of pure Alpha
aggression, just couldn’t tame himself at the best of times.
“Come on, I don’t get shipped out for another two months, minimum. Let’s go
find us a nice pair of Beta dames, and go dancing.”
Steve huffed, but agreed, and let Bucky usher him into the pub.
The bartender eyed Steve when Bucky sat him in one of the stools, and Steve
stared back, unconsciously assuming the most dominant frame he could, which
really didn’t work too well. Bucky took the seat next to Steve, and pushed his
enrolment notice in his pocket before turning to the nearest girl, offering his
wrist for her to smell—common etiquette. He smiled at her, all teeth and
sparkly eyes and Steve wanted to just leave and go home, or back to the
enrolment tent and demand that they take his enrolment seriously.
The dame turned Bucky down, and soon it became apparent that it was a lost
cause tonight, so Steve and Bucky went home to Bucky’s apartment and curled up
back-to-back on the mattress like they always did when they went to bed.
Akdgjlqervhrgve THer'es supposed to be a bigger paragraph gap here but AO3's
HTML is being a jerk
Steve didn’t stop trying to enlist. Nor did he stop smart-mouthing Alphas who
didn’t hesitate to corner him and throw a punch or two. It wasn’t so much smart
mouthing though, as standing up for people who didn’t have the nerve or will to
do so themselves, like the Omegas that had already been cornered by the Alphas.
It was almost embarrassing for Bucky to come and rescue him, but then Steve
recalled high school and the number of times and the manner in which Bucky had
helped him out then, how Bucky still had to help him in that manner, and
everything seemed to be put back in perspective.
After the fifth rejection from the military, Steve began to think that there
was no chance that he would be able to help, but Bucky was being deported in
three days, and he couldn’t just let Bucky go without him. But technically it
was illegal for someone to apply more than once, let alone five times, even if
he had ‘come from’ different cities. One more try wouldn’t hurt, would it?
But he had three days, was that enough time to find a recruiting station he
hadn’t yet visited without Bucky finding out?
Bucky had taken it upon himself to stop Steve going to war, no matter what. If
it weren’t so crippling to what little pride Steve had as an Alpha, he’d
probably find it rather endearing.
The night before Bucky was deported, Bucky, wearing his military uniform (he
looked quite smart, Steve thought), literally forced him out of the apartment
where Steve was drawing, and made him come downtown with a pair of Beta-females
who clearly didn’t believe that Steve was an Alpha, to the exhibition that was
being run by Stark Industries.
Okay, maybe that wasn’t the case. Maybe Bucky had stopped Steve from getting
his head punched in… again. And Steve might have agreed only because he just
found out that Bucky was being put in the 107th, the squadron that was being
sent directly to the front lines. (After a quick stop in England)
The expo was big. There were a variety of displays, but the one that took
centre stage was the flying car that Howard Stark himself was presenting.
To Steve, everything about Howard screamed ‘Alpha’, even if Howard didn’t
display the more physical characteristics of one. It was just something in the
way he carried himself, made himself heard by everyone around him, that gave
this away. Well, it wasn’t like Betas or Omegas were allowed to run such a
large company as Stark Industries anyway.
The flying car didn’t quite work properly, the things that replaced the wheels
exploded and the car hit the deck. Howard had just laughed. “I did say a few
years, didn’t I?”
At the Expo, Steve had spotted the military section, the developing weaponry
from Stark Industries, the display for the uniforms. He couldn’t really help
but leave Bucky and the girls whose names he never learnt, and wander over
there.
Akdgjlqervhrgve THer'es supposed to be a bigger paragraph gap here but AO3's
HTML is being a jerk
Steve’s reflection made it up to the shoulder of the military uniform on
display when he stepped on the plate and he was given two seconds to be
irritated about this before Bucky gave his shoulder a gentle shove.
“Come on, you’re kind of missing the point of a double date!” Bucky’s tone was
light-hearted, jovial.
“You go ahead, I’ll catch up.” Steve didn’t pause, just turned around, trying
to keep his face as straight as he could.
Bucky looked at the display over Steve’s shoulder, and almost sighed. “You
really going to do this again?”
Steve didn’t correct his grammar. “Well, it’s a fair. I’m going to try my
luck.” He turned away a little.
Bucky grabbed his shoulder and wrenched him around, borderline angry. “As who,
Steve from Ohio?” Steve didn’t meet Bucky’s eyes because it was true. “They’ll
catch you, or worse, they’ll actually take you.”
Steve wanted to bury his face in his palms, why couldn’t Bucky just understand?
“Look, I know you don’t think I can do this—”
Bucky spoke right over him. “This isn’t college, Steve. This is war.” Steve
huffed, close to a growl. “I know it’s a war!” The hand on his shoulder
tightened painfully. “Then why are you so keen to fight?” Bucky was barely
keeping his temper in check. “There are so many important jobs!” “What am I
going to do? Collect scrap metal,” “Yes!”
He disregarded the interruption and continued smoothly, “in my little red
wagon?”
“Why not?”
“I’m not going to sit in a factory, Bucky.” He paused and Bucky was still
trying to make him stop talking. “Bucky! Come on!” Steve altered his voice,
allowing, rather forcing a little Alpha in. Bucky shut up, compelled to listen
now. “There are men laying down their lives.” Not just men, Betas, Omegas too.
“I’ve got no right to do any less than them. That’s what you don’t understand.”
Neither of them noticed that they were being watched, and Steve’s voice changed
again, a little sad. “This isn’t about me.” It’s about you, because you’re the
only thing I have anymore.
Bucky raised an eyebrow. “I know, ‘cause you’ve got nothing to prove.” Steve
squared his jaw.
“Hey sarge!” The girls had probably been waiting outside, and had finally
gotten bored. “Are we going dancing?”
Bucky turned around, and spread his arms wide, “Yes we are,” He turned back to
Steve, but he was backing away. He was pointing at Steve then, trying to go for
the Stern-Beta, but really, it would never work on Steve. “Don’t do anything
stupid until I get back.”
“How can I?” Steve smiled a little. “You’re taking all the stupid with you.”
Bucky sighed and closed the space between them. “You’re a punk.” Firm arms
closed around him, and Steve hugged back, pressing his face into Bucky’s neck.
“Jerk.” Steve mumbled. He could feel Bucky’s warm breaths on his neck, and he
clapped his hand on the Beta’s shoulder. “Be careful.” Not that Bucky had to be
careful.
Bucky backed away, and saluted to him before jogging lightly down the steps,
and swept a girl under each arm. “C’mon girls, they’re playing our song.”
Steve didn’t move until he was certain that Bucky and the girls had left.
Right, he was going to make them take him.
The check over they did of him was pretty standard. Heart and respiration rate,
blood pressure, temperature, a small blood sample, pheromone check—the doctor’s
eyebrow’s shot up when he checked that one—plus height and weight. Steve hadn’t
been strictly truthful when he put down his extensive list of allergies, lying
about his asthma and his major issue with Omegas in heat, and when the doctor
left, and he was buttoning his shirt back up, he glanced around and felt a
moment of fleeting panic when he saw the sign that said ‘it is a punishable
offence to falsify your medical details’.
And then the Beta with the helmet marked MP pushed the curtain aside and stood
there at attention, staring at the far wall until another doctor walked in and
dismissed him.
The doctor wasn’t young, wore round glasses, and gave off a similar, flat scent
to Bucky. So he was a Beta too.
The doctor didn’t look at him for a long while; instead opting to read the
clipboard he had in his hands—Steve’s medical file—and finally, after a long
painstaking wait, looked up calmly. “So you want to go to overseas, and kill
some Nazis?” Steve nearly flinched when the man spoke in a thick German accent.
Weren’t they fighting the Germans? So what was this man doing here?
“Excuse me?”
“Dr Abraham Erskine. I represent the Strategic Scientific Reserve.” They shook
hands, and Erskine flipped through Steve’s file a little more.
“Steve Rogers.” He stood around for a moment, not quite sure what to say next,
so asked the question that had been bugging him. “Where are you from?”
“Queens, 73rd street, and Utopia Parkway.” He paused, as if to take in Steve’s
reaction. “Before that, Germany. This troubles you?”
Steve shrugged. It didn’t really bother him at all. Erskine wasn’t the first
German he had met. “No.”
“So where are you from, Mr Rogers?” Erskine ran a finger down Steve’s file. “Is
it New Haven? Or Paramus?” Oh goodness he had all of Steve’s files. “Five
exams,” He held his hand up, fingers splayed, “in five different cities.”
“Uhh… that may not be my file.”
Erskine just spoke over him. “No, no. It’s not the five exams I’m interested
in. It’s the five tries.” There was a difference in that? “But you didn’t
answer my question. Do you want to kill Nazis?” He spoke a little slower then,
spelling the question out.
“Is this a test?” Steve couldn’t think to say much else, why else would the
doctor be asking such a question of him?
The man thought for a bit, and shrugged. “Mmm, yes.”
“No.” Steve didn’t have to consider that answer on bit. Various things affected
that decision, Bucky, his late mother, the guys at school who pushed him around
just because he was smaller and weaker than them, and therefore supposedly
subservient. “I don’t want to kill anyone. I just don’t like bullies. I don’t
care where they’re from. And I want to protect my friends.” He made that plural
even though Bucky was his only real friend.
“Well,” Erskine nodded to himself a little. “There are already so many big
Alphas fighting this war.” He looked down at Steve, lips quirked up in a grin.
“Maybe what we need now is the little guy.” The doctor folded Steve’s file up.
“I can offer you a chance.” Erskine pushed the curtain open, and walked out.
Steve followed. “Only a chance.”
Steve rubbed the tips of his fingers into his palms. He had been waiting for a
chance for three months. “I’ll take it!” What was he supposed to do? Apologise?
Change his mind?
“Good.” Erskine picked up a stamp, inspected the bottom of it, and put it down.
“So where is the little guy from?” He turned to Steve and looked over his
glasses at the blond. “Actually.” He turned back and picked up another stamp.
Steve could only chuckle. “Brooklyn.” He said, unable to stop grinning. The
doctor was giving off a very positive vibe.
Erskine stamped something on the most recent application and handed it to
Steve. “Congratulations, soldier.”
Steve nearly choked when he saw the letters ‘1-A’ stamped on his application in
bright red.
“You need to come back here tomorrow at noon to leave for training.”
Akdgjlqervhrgve THer'es supposed to be a bigger paragraph gap here but AO3's
HTML is being a jerk
He didn’t tell Bucky when the Beta finally got back to their apartment at some
ungodly hour, Bucky would make him go back and resign, Steve knew it because
Bucky considered actually getting enlisted a stupid thing for Steve to do, and
Bucky specifically said ‘don’t do anything stupid’.
Steve didn’t have to listen to Bucky anyway. He outranked the Beta, and if he
had to pull rank, he knew that Bucky would listen.
Bucky let Steve curl himself around the Beta when Bucky finally got home, bury
his nose in the thick hair, fingers dug tight into the already crinkled shirt
that Bucky hadn’t changed out of. Steve could feel Bucky shifting to press his
nose against the nearest of Steve’s glands—the one in his throat—rubbing it to
release a few pheromones.
Bucky’s breath sighed against his skin, warm and fluttery, and Steve squeezed
his eyes shut against the room lit by the streetlamps outside, and the tears.
He really didn’t know what he would do if Bucky never came back, if he just
fell off the edge of the Earth, and didn’t return to their apartment. Would
Steve have to find a new flat mate? But then that was wrought with dangers. He
would have to find someone who could put up with his allergies and it wouldn’t
be able to be an Omega because he hadn’t smelt an Omega on full heat before. It
would probably kill him.
“It’s going to be alright.” Bucky assured, but Steve could tell that he didn’t
think that. Bucky’s scent was all over the place; hardly mixed at all with that
of the two girls he had gone dancing with, and a little nervous, too strong for
him to be entirely calm. That, and Bucky’s hands were shaking where they sat,
one on Steve’s waist, the other folded between their bodies.
Steve shucked down so he was level with Bucky, inhaling as much of the Beta’s
scent as possible.
After all these years, they hadn’t imprinted, or bonded, or even mated for that
matter, but God Steve would be distraught if something happened to Bucky.
To be certain, he was proud that Bucky was going to fight for America, for
everyone he was leaving behind, including Steve, and sure, Steve liked to think
that he was the only reason Bucky was going to fight, because it was as sure as
hell that no one else would even consider Steve a good reason to fight.
“Sure.” Steve tried to ladle as much sarcasm into his tone as he could, and
when he opened his eyes, he could see Bucky’s smile.
From there, there wasn’t much place they could go, well, there was sleeping,
and Steve sure as hell wasn’t tired, too nervous for Bucky’s life, and excited
that he finally got recruited, or there was—okay, Bucky could choose as well.
At least it was his other option, Steve thought absently. He closed his eyes
and tilted his head back, and Bucky deftly plucked at the buttons on his shirt,
starting at the collar. Steve tried to reciprocate the movements, strip Bucky
of his shirt, but couldn’t steady his hands enough. Once his own shirt was
gone, Bucky’s hands helped him, and then Steve was almost melting into the
Beta’s warm chest, trying to prolong the moment as much as possible.
He wasn’t permitted to do nothing for long, as Bucky pressed their lips
together urgently, hardly letting Steve away for air. When they final broke
apart, Steve’s bottom lip was swelling, and they were both panting, and Bucky
was scraping his fingers through Steve’s hair, over his ears, down his
shoulders, ribs, to pull Steve closer by his bony hips, fingers digging into
either side of the base of his tail, and Steve gasped against Bucky’s lips.
They shifted against each other, practiced, deliberate, desperate, until Steve
bit down, into Bucky’s left shoulder, to choke his moan, and Bucky stilled his
hand between them, and curled tightly around Steve, tangling their legs
together.
Sleep didn’t take long after that.
Akdgjlqervhrgve THer'es supposed to be a bigger paragraph gap here but AO3's
HTML is being a jerk
“Here.” Bucky tossed him a shirt the next morning. Steve, still dragging
himself out of bed, didn’t question, just pulled the fabric over his head, and
found sleeve holes.
“This isn’t my shirt.” Steve finally mumbled when he realised that it was far
too baggy to fit him. He got out of bed, managing to get his legs underneath
himself, and stumbled over to Bucky. The hem nearly reached his knees, and the
sleeves easily covered his hands. “I can’t go out in this.”
“Why not?” Bucky turned and pressed a mug into Steve’s hands.
Steve just glared at him, and bought the mug to his lips. Bucky placed a large
hand on the top of Steve’s head and rubbed his ears.
“Look, you’ve left your mark,” he shrugged his left shoulder, where the
imprints that fitted Steve’s teeth exactly lay, “I wanted to leave mine.”
Steve mumbled something, and buried his nose in the coffee before getting the
rest of his clothes on. “What time is it?”
“Oh-five-thirty.” Bucky was already dressed, and he watched with veiled
amusement as Steve tried to dress as quickly as he could. Bucky had to be at
the docks at six. Why was he waiting for Steve? He should’ve left by now.
“Leave it on.” Bucky insisted when Steve went to change into a smaller shirt.
“You look good in it.”
Steve couldn’t help but smile a little, despite the despair gnawing at his
stomach, he was about to lose his only friend to the war that had consumed the
planet within a few months.
At least he would be right on Bucky’s tail.
Steve couldn’t eat anything, he felt a little sick, actually, but Bucky made
himself a peanut butter sandwich and ate it as they ran to the tram. Bucky
laughed at Steve when he had to double over and catch his breath after his
twenty yard sprint to leap on the back of the tram, and Steve tried to kick him
in retaliation.
They weren’t late, but Bucky did have to throw Steve over his shoulder in order
to be able to run there on time. Steve growled at him when he was let down, but
any complaint he had was erased when Bucky thumbed the edge of his ear.
“That’s cheating. You are cheating.” Steve jerked away, and huffed. He rubbed
his arms firmly. It was cold, and really early in the morning, and there was no
sun to break the frost.
“Am not.” Bucky grabbed Steve’s wrist and pulled him along. “Come on, Dock 6.”
The dock was cordoned off, only allowing military personal on the dock itself,
but before the barricaded off section was a wide swath of people, seeing off
their brave husbands and friends in the 107th. He didn’t complain when Bucky
kept a hold of his wrist to help him through the crowd.
They weren’t given much time to say goodbye, just a quick hug, a nuzzle, and a
promise of safety and a safe return before Bucky had to hurry away, leaving
Steve leaning on the wooden rail that stopped civilians spilling onto the dock,
and as the boat departed, everyone already below decks, Steve wondered if he
should have told Bucky that Erskine had allowed him to register for the army.
He swallowed back his regrets along with his tears, and found himself in a
conversation with a little old Beta lady as he walked back to the tram stop.
Akdgjlqervhrgve THer'es supposed to be a bigger paragraph gap here but AO3's
HTML is being a jerk
When he got to the training facility, the very first thing he did was unpack
his bag—too many books in there according the other people in his bunk area—and
get changed into the tan military fatigues, before lining up outside.
Before long, he was standing in a line that consisted of a few burly Alpha’s
that tried to give him a hard time in the bunk room, a handful of Beta’s and
three Omega’s. Steve adjusted his helmet, and made a conscious effort to
breathe through his nose. One of the Omega’s was about three days after his
heat, and really Steve couldn’t afford an asthma attack and the arousal that
came whenever he could smell an Omega in heat. Okay, it was annoying to him,
because really it didn’t seem to happen to anyone else.
Just as they were being handed clipboards with some kind of release form in the
event of their death or injury, a woman approached them, Steve thought, for a
moment, his heart had leapt out of this throat.
“Recruits! Attention!” She shouted, and this caused more than one of them to
stiffen automatically, and all of them to stand at attention. “Gentlemen, I’m
Agent Carter. I supervise all the operations for this division.” Steve couldn’t
help but track her with his eyes. She was too far away for him to get a scent,
but he, and everyone else, could hear her accent.
“What’s with the accent, Queen Victoria?” Well, he was too polite to say
anything, but apparently one of the other Alphas wasn’t. “I thought I was
signing up for the US army.”
“What’s your name, soldier?” She didn’t even flinch; probably used to this kind
of treatment. She walked over to the offending Alpha, shorter than him by a few
inches, but somehow she let off a presence to match his.
“Gilmore Hodge, Your Majesty.” He puffed himself up, tilting his head to make
himself even taller, exerting an Alpha’s presence—clearly used to using his—to
try to undermine her.
It didn’t work. “Step forwards, Hodge.”
Hodge looked around, waggled his eyebrows at the Beta next to him, but obeyed.
His nostrils flared when he stepped into her personal space, and he smirked.
“Put your right foot forwards.”
Hodge did so. “We gonna wrestle?” He asked, all cocky, “Cause I got a few moves
I know you’ll like.” He winked and jerked his head, and Agent Carter balled her
fists up, but settled for glaring at him. “Omega.” Oka-ay that wasn’t expected,
but Steve suddenly liked Agent Carter a hell of a lot more. Because he always
respected an Omega that could take care of themselves. Like his mother.
Carter didn’t even hesitate, and her fist knocked Hodge flat on his back and
she shifted her jaw, put her hair back into place, and Steve pretty much fell
in love on the spot, after biting his tongue to stop himself from sniggering
with the rest of the recruits.
“Carter!”
Agent Carter snapped to attention instantly, her hands folding behind her back,
precisely above her neatly groomed tail, just as she spun on her heel to face
the man who called. “Colonel Phillips!” There was a hint of surprise in her
voice.
Everything about Colonel Phillips translated to Alpha in Steve's mind, from his
haircut to the confident way he walked, even with a limp. He stopped by Agent
Carter’s side, and she turned to face the recruits again. Phillips surveyed the
man on the ground. “I can see you are breaking in the new recruits, that’s
good.” He paused, almost as if to sigh. “Get your ass up out of that dirt and
stand in that line until someone tells you otherwise.” Hodge scrambled to his
feet as quickly as he could, and stood tall back in his place, nose bloody, and
shouted; “Yes sir!” Clearly, he respected an Alpha far more than an Omega.
Steve’s ears flattened just a little under his helmet. He just thought that
rude and inconsiderate.
Phillips scrunched his nose up a little in disdain, and then continued.
“General Patton, has said, that wars are fought with weapons, but they are won
by men.” He turned around, and started walking back down the line of soldiers.
“We are going to win this war because we have the best men.” He stopped then,
his eye caught by Steve. “And because they are going to get better.” He glanced
away, at Erskine, who just smiled in his smug manner, and didn’t even look away
from Steve. “Much better.” Steve kept his eyes straight forwards, at the tree
across the yard. He was going to be the best soldier he could be. Even if his
helmet slid around on his head when he turned to look somewhere. “The Strategic
Scientific Reserve, has an allied effort of the best minds of the three worlds.
Our goal; to create the best army in history.”
Steve resisted the urge to raise an eyebrow. Good luck making a better army
than the Spartan soldiers, or even, really despite the jokes, the French
artillery.
Oh, and Phillips tended to pause at the least expected moments. It was rather
irritating. “But, the army will star one man. At the end of this week, we will
choose that man. He will be the first, in a new breed of super-soldiers. And
they, will personally escort, Adolf Hitler to the gates of hell.”
Akdgjlqervhrgve THer'es supposed to be a bigger paragraph gap here but AO3's
HTML is being a jerk
That week of training was hell. Steve was constantly on the edge of asthma, and
at the complete mercy of the other Alphas in his squadron.
He couldn’t climb the ropes, could hardly crawl through the mud, and his effort
was halted when Hodge kicked in one of the rails that held up the wire he was
crawling under. He was completely stuck, and had to endure the Beta overseeing
that day’s training shouting at him because he got mud on the butt of the rifle
he was carrying before he was let out.
Today was not his day.
Actually, it wasn’t his week.
On the fourth day, they went for a run. It was about thirty-two degrees (JFC
90˚F), and so humid. They were constantly shouted at, told to ‘run faster,
double-time!’ Steve was actually in risk of a very severe asthma attack (When
wasn’t he, really?), and was entirely convinced that his lungs were about to
give up on him when the party was called to a halt. He managed to stumble a
little closer to his squadron.
The Beta overseeing their weeks’ training pointed to a tall white flag post.
“That flag, means that we’re only at the half way point.” Steve just leant on
his knees and drew in as much air as he could until he felt that he wasn’t
about to die. “First man to bring me that flag gets a ride back with Agent
Carter!”
Of course, this offer sent every man, except Steve, including the Omegas
(except they didn’t get far), running to the post to climb it and fetch the
flag. Every Alpha got a chance, and a few of the Beta’s got to have their shot
at climbing the flag pole, which was probably greased, and they were encouraged
by the shout of ‘no one’s gotten that flag in seventeen years!’, before the
Beta in command shouted at them to fall in.
Steve ignored him. Not because he was an Alpha and felt that he didn’t have to
listen to a Beta, but because he knew he could get the flag.
He walked up to the base of the post, ignored the specific shout of ‘Rogers! I
said fall in!’, and squatted to shimmy out the peg that held the pole in its
stand. The pole squeaked as it slipped from the metal bracket that held it
upright, and crashed to the ground, bouncing once, before coming to rest
against the dry grass. He tossed the peg aside and walked over to the flag to
retrieve it.
Who said Alphas were all brawn?
He handed the flag to the Beta in command. “Thank you, sir.” He said quietly,
and then stepped into the idling jeep, vaguely aware of Agent Carter, who was
twisted in her seat, pencil tucked behind her ear where she had left it, and he
could’ve sworn she was trying not to smile. She turned in her seat the other
way, glanced at Steve, and turned to face the front again, and Steve sank into
the jeep’s back seat gratefully.
Akdgjlqervhrgve THer'es supposed to be a bigger paragraph gap here but AO3's
HTML is being a jerk
“Faster ladies, come on.” Whilst she was gorgeous and had the ability to knock
a proud Alpha on his back, Carter was also a slave driver and knew just what to
say to make all of them, Steve included, bristle angrily. “My grandmother has
more life in her, God rest her soul.”
Really, Steve couldn’t quite understand why he was being expected to match the
rest of his squad push-up for push-up. He was about half the weight of the next
heaviest one, and to date, he hadn’t been able to do five push-ups on his knees
without triggering his asthma, but damn he was going to die trying.
Because Erskine had offered him that chance, and he wasn’t backing down.
“Move it!” she shouted, and Steve locked his arms so he wouldn’t collapse. He
got in two more push-ups in before they were ordered to their feet. Steve
caught a glimpse of Erskine and Phillips talking by one of the jeeps. “Jumping
jacks.” Carter called. Steve squeezed his eyes shut and got to work. Apparently
they weren’t fast enough. They never were. “Move it, girls.” She ordered.
Steve wasn’t entirely sure how much time passed before Colonel Phillips
suddenly yelled ‘Grenade!’. Steve’s eyes shot open immediately, and he saw the
black ball-like object before Hodge even had the time to shout ‘Move!’
Steve moved, all right.
When everyone else scattered, Steve pretty much threw himself to the ground,
scrambling to cover the grenade with his body. He might be skinny, but even his
body must be enough to dampen the blast and save everyone else in the vicinity,
including Carter. Speaking of which…
Steve waved his arm when he saw Carter’s feet approaching, and shouted at her
to get away, get to cover! Because it was his duty as an Alpha to protect
everyone else, and he didn’t have the right to do any less than that.
When the grenade didn’t explode, he slowly unwound himself and propped himself
up on his elbows. Erskine was giving Phillips a look, and Steve hesitantly
spoke. “Is this a test?”
Phillips said something and walked off, and the smile that Erskine shot Steve
said; yes, but you pass.
Akdgjlqervhrgve THer'es supposed to be a bigger paragraph gap here but AO3's
HTML is being a jerk
The adrenaline that came with leaping on a grenade didn’t dissipate easily, so
he found himself sitting on his bunk reading, after the other recruits had been
shipped out, he had been left behind, he was that chosen super-soldier. He was
a little freaked out, too. Just a little.
Really, how were they going to turn him into a super-soldier? He had been given
a brief overview of the procedure, and it involved needles and science and he
had understood about one in three words.
He was lucky, when Erskine knocked on his door. “May I?’ He asked for
permission to enter, even though he probably outranked Steve in military terms,
if not biologically.
“Yeah.” Steve set his book down, and twisted to watch Erskine approach him.
“Can’t sleep?” Erskine unfolded the next bed, and sat.
“Got the jitters, I guess.”
The scientist chuckled. “Me too.” Whether it was that confession, or the Beta’s
reassuring, familiar scent, Steve would never know, but a little bit of the
tension drained from his shoulders.
“Can I ask you a question?” There was something that had been bugging him.
“Just one.” Erskine held up a single finger.
Steve didn’t ask his question immediately, trying to think of a more eloquent
manner in which to ask it, but couldn’t find one. “Why me?”
The German sighed a slight laugh. “I suppose that is the only question that
matters.” He rolled something over in his hands—a bottle. In the dim light,
Steve could just make out the word ‘Schnapps’, printed across the label. “This
is from Augsburg, my city.” Erskine answered Steve’s curious look. “So many
people forget that the first country the Nazis invaded was their own.” He
stated this simply, calmly, and Steve felt compelled to listen. He might have
been soothed just a little by the accent. “After the last war, my people
struggled, for weeks.” The bottle was set down. “So, then Hitler comes along,
marching and the big show, and the flags, and the…” he waved his hands a
little, indicating extravagance. “And the… and he, he hears of me, my work, and
he finds me, and he says you.” Erskine pointed at Steve, an ugly, aggressive
emotion flickering across his face. “You will make us strong. Well,” the
scientist relaxed a little, and shook his head. “I am not interested. So he
sends the head of Hydra, his research division, a brilliant Alpha scientist by
the name of Johann Schmidt.” Steve let his eyes slid partially shut; content to
listen to Erskine’s story. “Now, Schmidt is a member of the inner circle. He is
ambitious; he and Hitler share a passion for a cult power, and Teutonic myth.
Hitler uses his fantasies to inspire his followers, but for Schmidt, it is not
fantasy. With him, it is real. He has become convinced that there is a great
power hidden in the earth, left here by the Gods, waiting to be seised by a
superior man. So, he hears about my formula, and what it can do. He cannot
resist. Schmidt must become that superior man.”
Steve felt a quirk of interest at that. “Did it make him stronger?”
“Ja,” Erskine half-shrugged, and tilted his head from side to side slightly.
“But there were other… effects. The serum was not ready, but more importantly,
the man.”
Steve’s brow pinched slightly in the middle. What would the man have to do with
the serum?
“You see, the serum amplifies everything that is inside, so good becomes great,
bad? Becomes worse. This is why you were chosen. Because a strong man, who has
known power all his life, will lose respect for that power, but a weak man
knows the value of strength, and knows, compassion.”
Umm… was that supposed to be a compliment or not? “Thanks… I think.”
Erskine gestured to something by Steve’s elbow. “Get the…” Steve turned to see
two glasses, one inside the other. He grabbed them, and Erskine picked up the
bottle. “Whatever happens tomorrow, you must promise me one thing.” He
unstoppered the bottle of alcohol, and Steve unstacked the glasses. “That you
stay who you are.
Not a perfect Alpha, but a good man.” He poured two careful measures and
pressed the cork back into the neck of the bottle, and set it aside.
Steve handed a glass to the scientist and sighed heavily. “To the little guys.”
He raised his glass, and Erskine touched it to his own. He had the glass at his
lips when Erskine grabbed his wrist.
“No! Wait, wait! What am I doing?” He took the glass off Steve. “You have
procedure tomorrow. No fluids.”
“Alright,” Steve shrugged, “we’ll drink it after.”
Erskine looked at him as if he had gone mad, and poured one glass into the
other. “No, I don’t have procedure tomorrow. Drink it after…” he muttered.
“I’ll drink it now.”
Steve couldn’t help but smile, and the Beta downed the two shots in one gulp.
Chapter End Notes
     It's been two months and one day since the unfortunate happenings
     described in the previous chapter. I'm sorry I took so long, but here
     it is! I would like to thank you all again, for your kind words, and
     I would like all of you to know that you really helped me get through
     a tough time, and I would also like you all to know that I have no
     school now, and that my inbox is open, both here and on Tumblr
     (lispetsketches.tumblr.com) in case any of you need to talk about
     anything that might be plaguing you. I have all the time in the
     world, and I really don't mind.
     As it is, I apologise for the amount of movie plot in this chapter
     and the next. I can't help it, as everything happens so quickly in
     the movie, and I refuse to change the plot. Also every time I read
     over it to Beta (haha), I couldn't help but read Erskine's part out
     in his accent because I love it.
     The next chapter will be out before the 25th, (meaning that I've
     actually written it, and beta'd it, but I am writing the chapter
     afterwards, just in case I have a writer's block so I have a back-up
     plan)
     Also I'm being awful to everyone and writing a Thorki fic, that will
     be truly terrible and gut-wrenching and tear-inducing. Really. I'm
     awful. But please, I have two questions so I can better understand
     the needs of Thorki shippers out there, because I know what I like,
     but I don't know what you like.
     1) Do you prefer the pairing to be platonic or romantic/sexual
     2) Do you think Loki deserves a happy ending after everything he did
     (BTW, he doesn't regret it, and he never will. He thought what he was
     doing is right)
     3) (I lied) are you happy with a temporary Steve/Loki? Even if it's
     more hurt/comfort than sex.
     ALSO THE GUY I HAVE LIKED FOREVER AGREED TO GO OUT WITH ME JUST AN
     HOUR AGO I THOUGHT YOU SHOULD ALL KNOW THIS BECAUSE I AM TOO EXCITED
     TO BE RATIONAL
     It doesn't help that he's my Sempai.
***** You Just Got Promoted. *****
Chapter Summary
     “Son, do you want to serve your country, on the most important
     battlefield of the war?”
     Steve stopped, and nodded. “Sir, that’s all I want.”
     The senator took his hand and shook it firmly. “Then congratulations,
     soldier. You just got promoted.”
Chapter Notes
     Also I am sorry for the bad formatting. the HTML seems to hate me.
     There is supposed to be a larger gap just before it says '1942', and
     another one just before Steve asks them if they've taken enough
     blood.
See the end of the chapter for more notes
Bucky could see it easily, the letter that would be sent home, to America, to
Steve.

     To whom it may concern.
     We bitterly regret to report that Sargent James Barnes, after a
     series of unfortunate events, has been declared killed in action.
     Our greatest condolences.
Beautiful.
Short and sweet, just enough for Steve to cry over.
There is shouting in German, enough to snap him out of his musings. So, back
for round oh God Bucky’s forgotten.
He hurts, aches, burns. But he’s proud. He hasn’t broken yet.
They’ve drugged him, beaten him, cut him, burnt him, scarred him in every way
possible, but he hasn’t broken yet. He hasn’t betrayed his country, hasn’t
betrayed Steve. And he knows he won’t.
They turn him over and strap him back down so his bare chest is pressed against
the freezing metal of the table—he’s been lying against it for too long and it
hasn’t warmed up yet—and they cut his tail off slowly, about a quarter inch at
a time. He screams and cries and can’t think of anything being more painful
until he’s left with half a tail, and they scrape the fur and skin off with the
flat of the knife and rub salt into the open flesh.
He can’t scream anymore.
1942
Steve hadn’t ever felt the need to impress anyone before. He never had to try
with Bucky, and no one else had shown enough interest for him to want to make
anyone else feel anything but contempt or pity for him. But that was before he
was shoved in the back seat of a car, with only Agent Carter for company.
Hodge’s assessment of her had been correct. She was indeed an Omega, and he
smoothed the fur on his ears when he removed his hat politely.
He didn’t dare look at her. Women, well, Omegas in general weren’t his forte.
No, he was better at sitting in the corner, and watching twitchily as Bucky did
all the talking.
The neighbourhood they were driving though was familiar to Steve. It was a few
blocks from where he had lived with his mother before she died. And why
couldn’t he keep his mouth shut right now?
He put it down to nerves. “Hey, I know this neighbourhood.” He had his nose
plastered to the window of the automobile, ears flicking back and forth. It
wasn’t often he got to travel in an automobile, and he was kind of enjoying it,
even if it was roasting hot in the black car. “I got beat up in that alley. And
that parking lot… and… behind that diner…” his voice trailed off towards the
end, and his ears burnt with heat. He knew how stupid he sounded, but he
couldn’t stop the words.
“Did you have something against running away?” Carter replied. She actually
spoke to him. He was glad he was sitting on his tail. He probably wouldn’t be
able to contain it properly if he weren’t.
He shook his head. “If you start running, they’ll never let you stop.” He
turned back to the window and watched a herd of scruffy looking children run
past with sticks. “If you stand up, push back… can’t say no forever, right?” He
glanced back at Carter for her opinion.
“I know a little of what that’s like. To have every door shut in your face.”
Steve wasn’t stupid. He could read between the lines there. She had fought
tooth and nail for her current job, because she was supposed to be inferior.
She got what she wanted, but she also got the misogynistic jerks that came with
the military.
The next words out of Steve’s mouth ran away from him before he could stop
them. “I guess I just don’t know why you’d want to join the army if you’re such
a beautiful Omega,” he floundered and tried to correct himself after realising
what he said. “Uhh… beauti—woman, uhh… agent, not an Omega. You are beautiful…”
Carter turned to look at him, something akin to amusement in her eye, but Steve
could’ve been imagining that because she was otherwise appearing rather stern.
“You have no idea how to talk to an Omega, do you?”
Steve chuckled quietly to himself. “I think this is the longest conversation
I’ve had with one.” He sighed and fidgeted with his cap. “Omegas aren’t exactly
lining up to dance with the Alpha they might step on.”
“You must’ve danced.” Carter sounded disbelieving.
“No.” He shrugged. “Asking an Omega to dance always seemed so terrifying. And
the past few years it just… it didn’t seem to matter so much.” Not with
college.
Not when he had Bucky willing to take him in his arms when necessary. “I
figured I’d wait.” Besides, he didn’t really mind a great deal. There still
were the really desperate Omegas who slunk around his peripheries anyway,
usually older or ill. Bucky always ushered him away before anything happened
though.
“For what?” Carter didn’t sound like she was mocking him at all.
Steve nearly said several things then; ‘You’ was one of them, then ‘I’m not
waiting, my Beta just deported last week.’ Was the second, but he settled for;
“The right partner.” Steve tried not to think about how sentimental that
sounded, and focused more on how the automobile was pulling over, and he had to
get out now.
He held the door open for Carter, and closed it behind her, and followed her
into the antique store.
Carter spoke to the shopkeeper, said something cryptic about umbrellas, and
then she was ushering him into the backroom where there was a bookcase.
The bookcase opened away as if it were a door, and Steve’s jaw nearly dropped
open when he saw the corridor that it was hiding. They walked along that
corridor, people parting for them along the way, and Steve kept his eyes
forwards, locked on the double doors at the far end. They went through those
doors, too, and Steve found himself overlooking a large chamber, where there
was a bench and a rather complicated and bulky machine set up. He swallowed,
and Carter looked at him as if expecting something, or as if reappraising him,
and before he could say anything, she turned to the right and alighted down the
stairs.
He realised that all activity in the room had ceased the moment he stepped up
to the railing, and blushed, before jogging to catch up to Agent Carter.
Erskine was waiting for him in the centre of the room, by the odd machine and
bench. He was greeted, and whilst he was talking to Erskine, there was a bright
flash of a camera, and Erskine turned to glare at the Omega in charge of the
camera. It vanished.
“You need to take off your shirt, your tie, and your cap, and lie down.”
Erskine turned away, and Steve fumbled with his clothes before stepping up to
lie on the padded bench. “Comfortable?” Erskine shifted his arms a little so
they weren’t so near the edge of the bench.
“It’s a little big.” Steve had his head where it was supposed to be, near the
top of the bench, but there was no way his feet reached the metal plate at the
base of it. Erskine chuckled. “Did you save any of that schnapps?” He probably
wouldn’t drink the alcohol, but it was a nice sentiment.
Erskine looked slightly guilty. “Not as much as I should have.” He glanced
away, and then back. “Sorry, next time maybe. Mr Stark?” Erskine backed away,
and bent to fiddle with a wire. “How are your levels?”
Steve couldn’t stop himself from looking when Howard Stark himself walked over,
looking just as in control as he did at the expo. Steve swallowed. “Levels are
at 100%. We may dim half the lights in Brooklyn,” he was pretty much standing
over Steve now. There was a nurse strapping him to the bench, but he couldn’t
really focus on that, “but we are ready…” He glanced down the length of Steve’s
body, and tucked the end of Steve’s tail under his leg. “As we’ll ever be.”
Well wasn’t that a confidence booster.
“Agent Carter, don’t you think you’d be more uncomfortable upstairs?” Erskine
pointed to the observation booth upstairs when he asked Agent Carter this.
Her gaze darted to Steve, now shirtless, and her ears twitched minutely, “Yes,
thank you.” As she was making her way back upstairs, she glanced back at Steve
and shrugged helplessly and gave him a small, encouraging smile. Steve tried to
smile back.
He looked back at the roof, and Erskine found a microphone and addressed the
men in the observation booth. Steve couldn’t hear what he was saying, and the
nurse that strapped him to the bench moved two metal arms, positioning them on
his chest. On either side of him, more nurses were inserting vials of a blue
liquid, Erskine’s serum, into the designed holes in the machine. Steve kept
staring at the fluorescent lights above him. This was it. No more little Steve
from Brooklyn, right? Erskine returned just in time to watch the first nurse
press a needle into Steve’s arm. Steve hissed and forced himself to hold still.
The tight, cold pinch of the injection was rapid, and dispersed quickly. Maybe
that was it.
“That wasn’t so bad.”
“That was penicillin.”
He turned his head to look sharply at Erskine, who shrugged and looked away.
“Serum infusion. Beginning in five, four,” time seemed to drag on, and Steve
felt pinches all over his arms and legs when the brackets were pressed into
place. “Three, two…” The metal arms on his chest seemed to grow needles, and
Steve bit his tongue. He could do this.
Erskine had offered him a chance, he took it, and now he was going to reap the
benefits of sticking to his choice. He could cope with a little pain.
Erskine put his hand in Steve’s hair for comfort. “One.” He looked away from
Steve, and there was an icy rush through his limbs, followed by a course of
intense heat. He clenched his eyes shut against it, and grit his teeth. Nothing
he could do to stop it now. It was too late. He would just have to put up with
it. When the serum reached his heart and lungs, his eyes shot open and he
gasped. Everything was suddenly so bright
“Now Mr Stark.”
Stark did something, and the bench Steve was lying on moved, shifting him so he
slid down to stand on the plate at the bottom of the bench. The odd metal parts
shifted too, moving to enclose him in the machine. He took a deep breath, and
it came easier than ever before.
There was three consecutive taps on the outside of the case, the noise
amplified from the inside. “Steven? Can you hear me?”
He didn’t think before he replied, just said the first thing that came to his
mind. “It’s probably too late to go to the bathroom, right?”
“We will proceed.” Was the last thing he heard.
The next thing he knew, the inside of the box was glowing, but the light didn’t
just hit his skin and bounce off. It seemed to reach into him, right to his
bones and his organs, pulling them around. It wasn’t so bad at first, but when
he had to close his eyes against the light, and the movement in his body became
too much, he couldn’t stop the yell that was pulled from his throat.
He could hear Erskine yelling his name, and pounding against the metal casing,
shouting for the process to stop, and he dug his nails into the palm of his
hand. They couldn’t stop now, he was so close. “No!” He screamed. He was
certain that Erskine could hear him. “Don’t! I can do this!”
The light intensified from there, and the pain almost seemed to recede, or
reach a plateau, or his body was growing and becoming more tolerant to pain.
There was a loud crackling sound, and Steve’s ears flattened into his hair, and
the light vanished entirely. He didn’t quite trust himself to open his eyes.
“Mr Stark!”
He could hear the hiss of the metal box as it slid open, and the following
intake of breath from everyone in the room when they saw him. He still hadn’t
opened his eyes yet. His body felt different, stronger, but he hadn’t moved
yet, he wasn’t sure if he was imagining it or not, and he didn’t want to open
his eyes and be disappointed if nothing changed. He felt two hands, one on his
shoulder, the other on his wrist, and he cracked his eyes open to see the
ground as Erskine guided him out of the machine. It seemed so far away.
Howard Stark was on his other side, and between the two scientists, Steve was
standing on the cool concrete.
“We did it.” He couldn’t help but smile. Yes, his body was definitely bigger,
stronger too. He couldn’t feel the pull of his lungs anymore from his asthma;
his joints didn’t creak when he moved. He had become the super-soldier.
“Yes, yeah, yes. I think we did.” Erskine let him go, and Steve could feel the
eyes of everyone in the room on him.
Carter was suddenly standing in front of him, breathing a little heavier than
normal. She looked him up and down. “How do you feel?”
He looked around, now standing on his own. He towered over everyone in the
vicinity. “Taller.”
She reached out as if to press her fingers to his chest, but thought better and
took the shirt that a nurse offered, and bunched it up to shove over his head.
He stooped to make it easier for her, and she rubbed his ears briefly on the
way past. “You look taller.”
He chuckled.
“My name’s Peggy, by the way.” She looked away, and then back again. “Just…
just thought you should know.” She was forced quiet when someone came up to
congratulate him. He smiled, (even the muscles in his face felt weird), and
shook the man’s hand.
“Thank you, sir.”
When the ball of fire ripped the observation booth to pieces, Steve didn’t
hesitate to push Peggy behind his back to protect her. He was busy making sure
that everyone around him was fine when the gunshot rang out.
He had always read books where it said that time seemed to slow, and scoffed.
It couldn’t happen could it? Some time in his future, someone would explain it
to him, how all the synapses in his brain fire at once, and he can just think
faster, but when he turned, and saw Erskine sliding to the floor, it happened
so slowly, and he thought for a split second that it was a side effect of the
serum. He was at Erskine’s side in a flash, crouching over the Beta, fingers
already working to get to the bullet holes, stem the bleeding, anything.
Erskine coughed, didn’t say anything, and Steve lowered him back to the
concrete gently. It seemed to take all of the scientist’s strength to lift his
right arm and poke Steve in the chest. Words echoed through his mind. Not a
perfect Alpha, but a good. Man.
He looked up, his jaw clenched, just in time to see Peggy running from the
room, chasing the man who shot, and killed, Erskine. Red tinted his vision, and
he followed.
He bounded over the old lady who had let them through the antique shop, also
shot, and didn’t notice the glass shards, and could only see how Peggy was
about to get hit by a taxi, and didn’t hesitate to tackle her out of the way.
He wasn’t sure how he managed to roll in the air so he hit the pavement first,
but it worked. Some of the anger seeped away when he realised that he just
saved Peggy’s life.
“I had him!” She shouted angrily. Steve nearly flinched under her wrath and
scrambled to his feet with an apology so he could follow the man.
He flew along the road, and faltered when his brain couldn’t match up with how
effortlessly he was running, his own bare feet propelling him along the road,
as fast as the automobiles either side of him. He lost control around a corner,
and crashed through a window, but after that he got the knack of it—he had
always been a quick learner—and all thoughts of how amazing his body was, how
limitless it felt, were gone from his mind in favour of chasing that yellow
taxi. He fell behind a little, and used his innate knowledge of this part of
Brooklyn to devise a shortcut, leaping easily over a fence that was as tall as
he was now, and then another shortcut on top of the cars, bouncing from roof to
roof, and finally flat on his stomach on the taxi’s top. The bullets fired
through the roof somehow, miraculously, missed him, and the car took the next
corner too fast, and the whole vehicle rolled.
Steve’s body moved without him having to tell it what to do, springing fluidly
from the metal roof and rolling when he hit the ground, and he could hardly
feel the ground, as if it were made of foam. He was on his feet in a flash, but
he heard the crack of the pistol that the man he was chasing had, and he ducked
away. In between shots, he ran to the door of the taxi, shorn clean off, and
lifted it, fingers digging into the internal padding, to make a rudimentary
shield. Two shots hit the door, both of the impacts jarring his arms, and the
second shot went right through, and there was fire in his ribs. The man was
running towards a group of children then, and grabbed one, ripping the young
boy away from the group. Steve used the corner of the building to shield
himself from the next bullet, and then a large steel buoy to hide from the
next. When no more shots came, he sprinted out from his hiding place and in
pursuit of the man, and when he skidded around the corner, he saw that they
were at the docks. The man had the gun pointed at the child, and Steve skidded
to a halt.
“Don’t!” was the only thing he could think to say. The man couldn’t just kill a
child! The gun was pointed at him instead, but it only clicked when the trigger
was pulled. Out of ammunition. The child was picked up, and just as Steve was
shouting not to do it, the child was thrown into the water.
He forgot his chase and ran to the water’s edge, fully prepared to throw
himself into the water to save the child. The kid was treading water, and waved
him on. “Go get him! I can swim!” Smarmy little bugger.
Steve only had to run another fifty or so meters until he could see the
strange, black vehicle disappearing into the water, and Steve didn’t hesitate
to dive in after it, glad for a split second that he hadn’t been wearing shoes.
He pushed through the water easily, and it took almost no effort to put his
fist through the glass roof of the submarine, and he ripped the door off, and
actually managed to throw the man from the water. He was on the docks in a
moment too, and when the man tried to get up, he didn’t stop himself from
jerking his knee up into the man’s face.
“Who are you?” He crouched and gripped the man’s sopping wet jacket, pulling
him up from the ground.
“The first of many.” The accent wasn’t disguised, and Steve felt horrified that
a German would kill one of his own brethren. “Cut off one head,” he knocked a
tooth out with his tongue and bit down on it before Steve could stop him, “and
two more shall take its place.” Foam started to form at the edges of the
German’s lips, and he started shuddering. “Heil Hydra!”
Steve let the man go when he slumped, and stood. Now that the chase was over,
gone along with his anger, he could only stand there and look around, his hands
shaking slightly. He looked down at them, large and strong, and realised what
he had just done.
He had run several kilometres and then dived into the bay to punch his way into
a submarine, and his hands were only shaking slightly from the adrenaline rush.
If only Bucky could see him now.
He didn’t flinch when the needle broke his skin, he just stared out of the
window, out over the workshop where Howard (the Stark had insisted) was piecing
apart the submarine that he had so gracelessly smashed two days ago. When the
needle was finally drawn from his arm, he could swear that the nurse took
several pints of his blood, he pressed a piece of gauze to the small hole.
“Think you’ve got enough?” He looked away from the factory below and turned to
Peggy instead.
“Any hope of reproducing the program is locked in your genetic code.” She
flipped all of the sheets of paper on her clipboard back into place, and
pressed them to her chest. “Without Dr Erskine, it will take years.”
Steve sighed, and rolled his sleeve down. “He deserved more than this.”
Peggy placed her hand on his arm, being careful to miss where the needle had
pulled blood from him. “If it could work only once, he would be proud it was
you.” He looked at Peggy, and saw that she was dead serious, and then looked
away and pressed his thumb into the centre of the gauze and it hardly hurt.
Apparently his hearing had been greatly enhanced by the serum, too, not just
his muscled, because he could hear the argument downstairs.
“Colonel, my committee is demanding answers.”
“Good,” Steve furrowed his brow. That was Phillips. “How about we start with
how a German spy got a ride to my secret installation in your car.” Steve stood
in time to see Phillips and two other men come to a halt where Howard was
working. “What have we got here?”
Peggy opened the door, and he followed her out into the workshop. They stopped
on the balcony.
“Speaking modestly, I’m the best mechanical engineer in this country.” Steve
grinned at Howard’s words. From what he had come to understand, Howard wasn’t a
very modest person. “But I don’t know what’s inside this thing, or how it
works. We’re not even close to this technology.” The Alpha engineer shrugged
and turned back to his work.
“Then who is?” One of the other men, the one who had been demanding answers,
rounded on Colonel Phillips.
“Hydra.” Phillips was gruff and short. “I’m sure you’re been reading our
briefings, senator.” Steve wasn’t sure of he was being sarcastic, or intoning
that the senator actually didn’t read the briefings.
“I’m on a number of committees, colonel” The senator bit back. Steve could see
the tension rising in the line of the senator’s body, short fur on his tail
standing on end.
Peggy waved for him to follow, and he did. “Hydra is the Nazi deep science
division, led by Johann Schmidt, but he has much bigger ambitions.” By the time
she had finished, she and Steve were standing in front of the senator and
Phillips.
Phillips nodded in agreement. “Hydra’s practically a cult. They worship
Schmidt, they think he’s invincible.”
The senator was the next to speak. “So what are you going to do about it?”
Phillips didn’t do anything for a second, as if contemplating whether or not to
tell the senator, but answered. “Spoke to the president this morning. As of
today, the SSR has been retasked.”
Peggy tensed. “Colonel?
The colonel directly addressed Peggy now. “We are taking the fight to Hydra.
Pack your bags, Agent Carter. You too, Stark. We’re flying to London tonight.”
Steve waited to be told to pack too, but wasn’t. Yeah, no. He was going to
capture Schmidt, for several reasons, he was probably the man who ordered
Erskine to be killed, and if what Erskine had told him, Schmidt was insane and
dangerous, and very powerful. Probably to the point where the only person who
might stand a chance at him head on was Steve. “Sir, if you’re going after
Schmidt I want in.”
Phillips seemed surprised that he had the gall to speak up. “You’re an
experiment, you’re going to Alamogordo.”
“The serum worked.”
Phillips stepped in close to lower his voice. “I asked for an army, and all I
got was you.” Steve bit his lip to stop himself from growling. Phillips stepped
away, and spoke slightly louder. “You are not enough.” He left.
Steve stood there and fumed silently, Peggy standing just behind him. One of
the senators approached. He was perhaps as old as Phillips, and carried little
scent. Beta. “With all due respect to the colonel, I think he may be missing
the point.” He put a hand on Steve’s shoulder, and turned him around so Peggy
couldn’t hear what was being said. “I’ve seen you in action Steve, but more
importantly, the country’s seen it.” He glanced at the other man and waved. The
day’s newspaper was handed to Steve. He swallowed when he saw himself, holding
the taxi door, splashed across the front. “The enlistment lines have been
around the block since this hit the news stand.
“You don’t take a soldier, a symbol like that, and hide him in a lab.” The hand
on his back was pushing slightly, and he allowed himself to walk along with the
senator a bit. “Son, do you want to serve your country, on the most important
battlefield of the war?”
Steve stopped, and nodded. “Sir, that’s all I want.”
The senator took his hand and shook it firmly. “Then congratulations, soldier.
You just got promoted.”
Chapter End Notes
     weoighwqripbue HOW COULD I DO THAT TO BUCKY ;A;
     I am so sorry. There is even more plot in this chapter.
***** The Star Spangled Man with a Plan *****
Chapter Summary
     “You know, for the longest time I dreamed about… coming overseas, and
     being on the front lines, serving my country.” He paused, and bit the
     inside of his lip. “I finally get everything I wanted, and I’m
     wearing tights.” Peggy reached out and put her fingers in his hair,
     and he leant into the touch. He closed his eyes for a moment, and
     over the pounding rain, he could hear people yelling, and an
     automobile’s horn. He looked over at where the sound was coming from.
     “They look like they’ve been through hell.”
Chapter Notes
     Christmas Special, motherfuckers.
     Last time I apologise for so much plot. I swear. At least until we
     get to the Avengers plot line.
     ahaha oh dear.
     I hope you enjoy, and that none of you have a cold/throat infection
     like I do.
     It's the middle of summer for goodness sakes ;A;
See the end of the chapter for more notes
1943
When he had been told what he was going to do for the war effort, Steve nearly
turned around and walked out of Senator Brandt’s office, but he stuck around
for long enough to listen to the rest of the sentence, then he grudgingly
agreed to dress up in a poor mock-up of the American flag, and walk on stage.
Because it would get him to Bucky quicker.
He got to the point where he was slightly itchy because the outfit he was
required to wear was made of wool, and he was holding a steel shield that was
painted to match what he was wearing, before he began to doubt his choice. He
was never good with crowds.
“I don’t know if I can do this.”
He could hardly listen to the man who was making sure that his clothes were
straight. He caught the last half of the sentence though… “Bing, bang, boom,
you’re an American Hero.”
He adjusted his grip on the shield, and pulled the hood of the clothing over
his head. “This is not how I pictured getting there.” Something a little less
embarrassing would be nice. Like shooting at someone.
He managed to catch the next sentence. “The senator’s got a lot of pull up on
the hill. If you pull this, you’ll be leading your own platoon in no time.”
There was one last yank on his uniform, and he was being pushed towards the
curtain, the first bars of the music started. “Go, go!” He stumbled out onto
stage.
It was then that he realised that he was in way over his head.
Basically, he had to advertise defence bonds, not the most prestigious thing
that he could be doing, but as he went from state to state, and gained
confidence, and his routine gained both popularity and extravagance, bond sales
increased in each state. Sure, it had him doing something, and he constantly
amazed himself with the things he could do, like pick up an entire motorbike
with three of the tour girls sitting on it, with ease, and he met so many
people, so many Omegas, who looked at him, and he could see in their eyes that
they were assessing their chances of becoming his mate, and the USO girls were
an amazing bunch, mostly Betas, and bonded Omegas, but he felt that he could be
doing more.
The USO girls taught him a lot, a lot of silly little things that he
appreciated anyway, like how to do cartwheels and handstands, and how to
improve his flexibility. One of them showed him that she could tie a knot in a
cherry stem with her tongue, (and naturally, the reference went completely over
his head), and he learnt how to do that, too.
His chance to do more came when he got flown out to Italy.
His performance flunked, and he spent the rest of the day sitting on the wooden
steps of the stage, drawing in the notebook that he had bought with him from
Brooklyn. It was so far, filled with little doodles, people he met along the
way, they all stuck in his mind, but the ones that came to the forefront, the
little girl who he had picked up to hold her above the heads of the crowd so
she could find her mother, the old WWI veteran who was missing his right leg
from the knee down. His pencil scratched into the paper in the dome-shape of an
umbrella—a recent addition to this particular drawing, because it just started
bucketing down with rain. He had long since pressed his ears to his skull to
stop water dripping into them, and tucked his tail between his legs for warmth.
He was so engrossed with his drawing that he didn’t notice Peggy until she was
standing over him.
“Hello Steve.”
“Hi.” He fumbled with his book, trying to close it, but gave up. “What are you
doing here?” Why was she this close to the front line? She could get seriously
hurt, and Steve really had to stop thinking like that. This was her job, she
chose to do it, and Steve admired her for it.
Peggy sat on the step above him, and curled her tail around so it covered her
lap. “Officially, I’m not here at all.” She sighed and squeezed water out of
the tips of her ears. “That was quite a performance.”
“Uhh yeah…” He stared at the mud between his feet. “I had to improvise a
little. The crowds I’m used to are usually a little more… uhh… well…” he waved
his hands vaguely.
He glanced up. Peggy’s face was impassive. “So I understand you’re America’s
new hope.”
Steve looked away and answered automatically. “Bond sales take a 10% bump in
every sale I visit.”
“Is that Senator Brandt I hear?”
“At least he’s got me doing this.” He braced his hands on his knees. “Phillips
would’ve had me stuck in a lab.”
“And these are your only two options. A lab rat, or a dancing monkey.” They
both looked at what he had been drawing. “You were meant for more than this,
you know.” He nodded in agreement to Peggy’s words, and opened his mouth, but
nothing came out. “What?”
“You know, for the longest time I dreamed about… coming overseas, and being on
the front lines, serving my country.” He paused, and bit the inside of his lip.
“I finally get everything I wanted, and I’m wearing tights.” Peggy reached out
and put her fingers in his hair, and he leant into the touch. He closed his
eyes for a moment, and over the pounding rain, he could hear people yelling,
and an automobile’s horn. He looked over at where the sound was coming from.
“They look like they’ve been through hell.”
“These men more than most.” Peggy’s fingers retracted from his hair abruptly,
as if she had been doing something she wasn’t supposed to be doing, and she
smoothed out the fur on her tail. Steve looked up at her questioningly, and she
hesitated before elaborating. She probably wasn’t supposed to tell him
anything. “Schmidt sent out a force to Pisano.” Steve knew that much. The USO
girls had been discussing it. “Two hundred men went up against him, and less
than fifty returned. Your audience contained what was left of the 107th. The
rest were killed or captured.”
Steve was utterly speechless for a long while, his brain steadily processing
the information. It suddenly clicked in the back of his mind. “The 107th!?”
Everything leapt into his brain at once. The first and foremost was Bucky.
Bucky, who had signed up for war, and had been assigned to the 107th, when
Steve should’ve have been right by his side.
He was up and running, pulling Peggy through the rain before he could stop
himself.
“What?” Peggy shouted, her coat draped over her head to keep herself dry.
“Come on!” Steve couldn’t get her to the administration tent quickly enough.
“Colonel Phillips!” He made a beeline for the old Alpha, who was sitting at a
desk, reading over some sheets of paper.
“Well, if it isn’t the Star Spangled Man with a Plan. What is your plan today?”
“I need the casualty list from Pisano.”
Phillips glared up at him. “You don’t give me orders, son.”
Steve bit back a ruder retort, and went for what he wanted. “I just need one
name, Sargent James Barnes, from the 107th.”
Phillips looked at Peggy, who was standing behind Steve, close enough for her
leg to be brushing his tail. She shrunk a little. “You and I are going to have
a conversation later that you won’t enjoy.”
Steve stepped closer to the Colonel. “Please tell me if he’s alive sir. B A R.”
“I can spell.” Phillips snapped, cutting him off. He stood, bringing with him
the sheets of paper. He flicked through them briefly. “I have signed more of
these condolence letters today than I care to count, but the name does sound
familiar.” Phillips turned to look at Steve. “I’m sorry.”
Steve’s world crashed, and he could only stare at Phillips. Bucky was… Bucky
was dead? No. It couldn’t happen. Bucky was strong and fast and clever. He
should’ve come back. He promised that he’d come back to Steve. Peggy’s hand
nudged his, and his brain leapt back into gear. “What about the others? Are you
planning a rescue mission?”
“Yeah. It’s called winning the war.” The other Alpha raised his eyebrows, and
Steve grit his teeth.
“But if you know where they are, can’t you at least…”
Phillips cut him off with a gesture to a map on the wall. “They’re thirty miles
behind the lines, through some of the most heavily fortified territory in
Europe. We’d lose more men than we’d save, but I don’t expect you to understand
that because you’re a chorus girl.”
Steve’s temper flared up, and his ears flattened against his head. Chorus girl?
No, damnit, he was not. “I think I understand just fine.”
“Then understand it somewhere else.” Steve turned away from Phillips, tuning
his voice out. He let his eyes fall over the map, dedicating as much of it to
memory as possible, which was to say, a lot. “If I read the posters correctly,
then I guess you have somewhere to be in thirty minutes.”
“Yes sir.” Steve turned away from the map. “I do.”
“What do you plan to do? Walk to Austria?”
Steve was halfway through collecting everything he thought that he would need
when Peggy caught up to him, stomping into the tent. He shrugged, and grabbed a
Miss A’s helmet. If he wasn’t going to be there for the show, she wouldn’t need
it. “If that’s what it takes.” He was getting Bucky back, or he wasn’t coming
back.
“You heard the Colonel.” Her voice softened. “Your friend is most likely dead.”
Steve pressed his ears flat and pulled the helmet over them. “You don’t know
that.” Neither did he, but he had to find out. As an Alpha, Bucky had been the
best thing that he had had in terms of a mate. He wasn’t going to just let that
slip away without a fight.
“Even so, he’s devising a strategy. If he finds out…” She placed herself
between him and the door.
He picked up his shield. “By the time he’s done that it could be too late.” His
voice came out as an angry snarl, and Peggy jumped out of the way in shock.
Steve strode straight past her.
“Steve!” She grabbed his jacket as he was tossing everything in the back of a
jeep.
Steve looked down at her, and ducked his head, a little doubtful. “You told me
you thought I was meant for more than this.” He dropped the shield with his
bag. “Did you mean that?”
Peggy held his gaze steadily. “Every word.”
He hastened to the driver’s seat. “Then you’ve gotta let me go.” He pulled his
tail out from under him quickly.
The Omega leant against the doorframe. “I can do more than that.”
...
So, more than that turned out to be convincing Howard to help them hijack an
aeroplane. It worked, they weren’t caught, and now, he was flying over the
Austrian border. Peggy was giving him orders, telling him where he was going.
He focused on the map she had handed him. They were about five miles from the
factory now.
“This is your transponder.” Peggy glared at him sternly, after a rather awkward
moment where he attempted to ask if Peggy and Howard were mated. He just had to
know. He took the little device.
“Does it work?” He asked.
Howard laughed from the cockpit. “It’s been tested more than you, pal.” He
called back. Steve grinned and tucked it in his pocket. After he had chased
down Erskine’s killer, and before he got dragged around the country as a
tourist attraction, he had been put through his paces, testing his strength,
speed, memory, you name it. They had collected just about every fluid sample
possible from him, blood, saliva, urine, sweat (that took ages), semen (that
was awkward), pure pheromones (that one was painful), and had taken numerous x-
rays, tested his healing capabilities, his metabolism, his resistance to
various toxins. There wasn’t a test that he wasn’t put through.
Just then, the plane shuddered, and Steve could hear the crack of bullets
hitting the belly of the plane. Both he and Peggy braced themselves. He grabbed
his shield, and tightened the strap of the parachute, and made for the door.
“Get back here!” Peggy demanded, spinning to follow him. “We’re taking you all
the way in.”
He ignored her. What was the point of being an Alpha if you couldn’t ignore an
Omega for her own good? If this plane was shot down, Peggy and Howard would
both die, and he would never forgive himself. He opened the rear door and sat
down, his legs hanging out in the icy air. “As soon as I’m clear, you turn this
thing around, and get the hell out of here!” He swallowed nervously and eyed
the pine trees, a mile below him. He hadn’t jumped out of a plane before.
She crouched next to him and grabbed his helmet, dragging his head towards her.
“You can’t give me orders!”
He looked up at her and detached her hand, and rubbed the palm with his thumb.
“The hell I can! I’m a captain!” He pulled his goggles on, gave her a grin, and
jumped.
The wind rattled his helmet and shield, and he nearly let it go, but when he
deployed the parachute, it stopped, and he floated towards the ground. For a
brief moment in the sky, before he fell below the tree line, he caught a
glimpse of an enormous building, lit up with large floodlights.
He rolled when he hit the ground, and dumped the parachute under a tree,
rolling it up tightly so it wouldn’t be found until long after he was gone.
He orientated himself, and started running.
It took him eight minutes to get to the gate. It took him all of three seconds
to realise that he had no chance of just walking in there. He only had to wait
another few minutes until a convoy came along. Pure luck. He vaulted into the
back of the last jeep, and found himself face to face with two armed men.
“Fellas.” They both leapt at him, and he slipped around them, blocking their
attacks, and kicked them both out of the jeep. He knocked out the man who
pulled the canvas that covered the back of the jeep away, and jumped out. A
glance around told him where he needed to go, and made haste for the main
factory.
He didn’t have to hit anyone else until he got to the locked door. He tapped on
the window and gained the attention of the guard on the other side. He happily
opened the door and poked his head through. Steve cracked the man’s head
against the concrete wall, and punched his nose in, before stowing the body
behind some boxes and making his way across the floor.
The factory wasn’t busy, but the air still buzzed with activity, shouted voices
form further down the hall, the whirr of machinery. Steve kept between large
gas cylinders, pistol drawn, and stayed out of sight. He stumbled across the
table that was playing host to unusual glowing blocks by accident, and took one
to bring back. Just in case it could help with the war effort, and continued.
The next time he was the cause of someone’s unconsciousness, he hit the man in
the face with his shield, and crouched to grab the keys on his belt. He was
standing over the metal grids that acted as the roof of some cells. There were
men inside.
“Who’re you supposed to be?” they were all looking up at him, but only one
spoke.
“Uhh… I’m Captain America.”
“I beg your pardon?” An English voice followed him as he made for the stairs.
He opened all of the prison cells, disregarded the terse conversation between
an Alpha with a bowler hat and a man who appeared Japanese, but who definitely
came from Fresno, and asked if there was anyone else. Bucky wasn’t here. Steve
started to worry that Peggy had been right.
“Is there anyone else? I’m looking for a James Barnes.”
The English man spoke to him. “There’s an isolation ward on the other side of
the factory, but no one’s ever come back from it.”
Steve swallowed around the lump in his throat and nodded, rethinking his
options. He would have to check the facility, he wasn't taking the chance that
Bucky might not be there, and leave these soldiers to get out on their own.
“The tree line is north west, eighty yards past the gate. Get out fast, and
give ‘em hell. I’ll meet you in the clearing with anyone else I find.” He
didn’t look back until one of them told him to wait.
“Do you even know what you’re doing?”
He said the first thing that came to his mind that might give these men some
courage. “Yeah. I’ve knocked out Adolf Hitler over two hundred times.” So it
was part of his routine with the USO girls, but still true. They all looked at
each other, and Steve left.
If he hadn’t seen the little man leaving a room when he got to the other side
of the factory, he wouldn’t have found Bucky. Instead of following the Beta—he
left no distinctive scent behind—he went into the small room, and found Bucky
strapped to a gurney, mumbling vague pieces of information.
He leant over the brunet’s side. “Bucky!” He glanced down his friend’s body.
“Oh my God.” Starting at Bucky’s feet, he broke the straps holding him down,
and freed him.
“What is… what is that?” Bucky’s eyes couldn’t focus on him very well.
“Bucky, it’s me. It’s Steve.” His hand was in Bucky’s hair rubbing into his
skull gently, and his other hand was at Bucky’s hip, prepared to pick Bucky up
if he had to.
Bucky’s eyes finally focused, and he smiled. “Steve.”
“Yeah, come on.” He helped Bucky up, and when they were both standing, Steve
cupped his hand around the back of Bucky’s neck, pressed their foreheads
together. “I thought you were dead.”
Bucky leant away and looked at him. “I thought you were smaller.”
Steve didn’t answer, and looked around the room frantically. They had to get
out. Now. His eyes fell on a map that had six locations marked. He glanced over
each of them. Italy, Greece, Poland, Czechoslovakia, Austria and Belgium. (Yes
I paused and squinted over the map for five minutes to figure them all out…
>.>)
Now they had to get out. “Come on.” He had Bucky’s arm over his shoulder, and
his arm around the brunet’s waist.
“What happened to you?” Bucky asked as they moved down the corridor.
Steve paused and pressed his nose into Bucky’s hair. “I joined the army.” He
breathed in, expecting to be reassured that Bucky was fine, but he smelt…
wrong. Too sweet, and dirty. But considering that he was covered with grime,
that was expected.
Bucky was full of questions as he slowly got use of his legs back. “Did it
hurt?
“A little.”
“Is it permanent?”
“So far.” Bucky was running alongside Steve now.
When he got back to the factory floor, it was all in smoke and flames. He urged
Bucky up the stairs, and they ran into Schmidt. Schmidt put a three-inch dent
in his shield, and then pulled his own face off. Steve wanted to throw up. The
man under the mask was a demon, blood red skin, no nose, ghastly holes for ears
and pronounced canine teeth.
They were cut off from the exit, after Schmidt left. The little Beta scientist
had retracted the bridge, and there were no controls on this side. Instead,
Steve saw a crane beam on the level above. They could cross that. He made Bucky
go first. He would rather stay here and die knowing that Bucky was safe, than
have Bucky be engulfed in flames, and be alive himself.
Bucky had to leap from the beam as it collapsed under his feet, and landed
safely on the other catwalk, but it left Steve stranded. Bucky looked up,
clutching the guardrail between his hands. “There’s gotta be a rope or
something!”
“Just go!” Steve refused to stand and watch Bucky burn with him. “Get out of
here!” He wasn’t above using his Alpha status to make Bucky listen to him.
“No!” Bucky slammed his hands against the rail, every line of his body defiant.
“Not without you!”
Steve gulped and took another look around, before kicking in his side of the
railing out and backing away to give himself the best run up as possible.
This was it. Leap of faith. He could do this, right?
He sprinted towards the edge of the catwalk, bounded off the edge, right over
the flames, and mid leap, he knew he wasn’t going to make it.
Chapter End Notes
     So sorry for those who haven’t seen the movie. That must be heart
     stopping.
     But if you’re one for cliff-hangers, read Matthey Reilly’s Seven
     Ancient Wonders series. The second book actually ends with one of the
     most awfully suspenseful cliff-hangers ever. Seriously. And it’s a
     good book, too. Totally should become a movie. (and when I say movie,
     I mean seventeen hour epic with perfect casting and every little
     teensy detail included.)
     Also I'm not sure if it's Pisano that the 107th go to, I Googled it,
     and it's a bakery somewhere in North-West Italy...
     Oh, also, I told mum that she won't want to read this, and she thinks
     it's soft-core porn. She thought I was laughing in embarrassment
     because it was true...
***** The Beginning of the End of the Beginning *****
Chapter Summary
     The bar was silent around him, and it made the sound of the bottle
     against the table seem that much louder. Steve couldn’t focus on much
     else aside for the burn of the liquor as it slid down his throat. If
     he thought of anything else, he would think, undoubtedly of Bucky,
     and he would break something else.
     He didn’t see how burnt and damaged the bar was around him—victim to
     the air raids—and he certainly didn’t see Peggy enter, too
     preoccupied by his distraction to notice.
Chapter Notes
     asdghjkl; I finally forced myself to finish this chapter. And the
     next one, but that's cheating and you'll see why because I'm posting
     that too. I feel awful. I. Gosh. This is a good and a bad chapter, I
     guess.
1943

He missed the platform entirely, even stretched out, his fingers just didn’t
reach far enough, but then he jerked to a halt, a vice like grip around his
wrist, and he looked up and opened his eyes to see Bucky, flat on his belly,
holding his wrist tightly.
“Damn, you’re heavy.” Bucky groaned, and hauled Steve up so that the super
soldier could pull himself up. “That was a leap and a half.” Bucky flopped over
Steve’s stomach and nuzzled his face into the nearest part of Steve he could
reach when they were both lying on the metal grating.

It was a thirty-five mile hike back to the camp that Steve had been performing
for. He had possibly forgotten about that part. It took them nearly two days,
even with the numerous jeeps and tanks they had arrogated. Anyone too injured
or exhausted got a ride back. Everyone else walked, Steve at the front.
Bucky didn’t let go of his hand the whole trip, as if afraid that Steve would
just vanish, or revert back to what he used to be. Steve didn’t want to let go,
afraid that Bucky might be lying to him about how injured he was. There was a
cheer when they finally saw the checkpoint, and Bucky squeezed his hand. The
entire rest of the 107th was waiting for them at the gate, a path right down
the middle, leading them directly to the recreation grounds. Bucky abruptly
released his hand, and adjusted his grip on his misappropriated rifle. Steve
looked at him and smiled.
He had Bucky, his Bucky, his mate, back.
When he spotted Colonel Phillips, the grin slid off his face.
He was in so much trouble.
He came to a halt and saluted the older Alpha and got straight down to business
before Phillips could say anything. “Some of these men need medical attention.”
Phillips looked around, and Steve knew that he was going to regret the next
words he had planned to say. “And I would like to submit myself to disciplinary
action.”
Steve could almost feel Bucky tense behind him, and Phillip’s gaze was arrested
by something over Steve’s shoulder, probably Bucky’s alarmed (and possessive)
expression. “That won’t be necessary.”
Bucky took his hand and squeezed it gently, and Steve couldn’t stop the smile
as much as he would have liked to. “Yes sir.”
Peggy approached him next, clearly angry about one thing or another. She eyed
Bucky off over Steve’s shoulder. She looked up at him, ears flat against her
skull. “You’re late.” She was angling for indignant, but failed.
Steve patted his pockets for the comm. unit she had given him. He held it up.
It was clearly crushed. “I couldn’t call my ride.” Peggy’s ears relaxed, she
rolled her eyes, and Bucky let go of his hand.
“Hey!” everyone quietened down to look at Bucky. “Let’s hear it for Captain
America!”
Steve could only stand there and endure the praise. People patted his back,
knocked on his helmet gently, and Bucky pressed himself against Steve’s back
and pulled on his tail.

When Steve was supposed to be receiving a medal that no one told him about,
Steve was underground in London, marking a map so that it resembled the one he
had seen in the room where he found Bucky. He murmured to himself as he wrote.
When he finished, the map was whisked away, and Peggy was looking at him in a
funny way.
“I just got a quick look.” He explained.
“Well,” Peggy raised her eyebrows briefly. “Nobody’s perfect.” She led him to
the large map on the table, where someone had already set up little flags and
model factories.
“These are the factories we know about. Sergeant Barnes said that all the parts
got shipped to another facility that isn’t on this map.”
Phillips surveyed the map for a brief moment. “Agent Carter, you are to
coordinate with MI-6. I want every allied eyeball looking for that main Hydra
base.”
“What about us?” When Peggy said ‘us’ she was including Steve.
“We, are going to set a fire on Johann Schmidt’s ass. What do you say, Rogers?”
Phillips accepted some documents from a blonde Omega-dame. “With that map, do
you think you can wipe Hydra off the planet?”
Steve glanced at the map. “Yes sir. I’ll need a team.” He had a few people in
mind…
“We’re already putting together the best men.”
“With all due respect sir, so am I.”

The next place Steve went was a pub a few blocks down, after inviting a few
people. He waited for the men to get a ways into their beer before he proposed
his idea.
“So let’s get this straight…”
“…We barely got out of there alive, and you want us to go back?”
After a month stuck in the same cell in Austria, the group of men had pretty
much learnt to read each other’s minds. Either that, or these two were a bonded
pair. Which would be better in the long run for the team, but not in the long
run for life.
Steve shrugged. “Pretty much.”
The English Alpha adjusted his watch. “Sounds rather… fun, actually.”
The Beta from Fresno belched, and Steve could see his tail wagging excitedly.
“I’m in.”
Two more of the men conversed in French for a second, their conversation more
an exchange of body language and hand gestures than anything. They shook hands,
and the dark-skinned man looked around. “We’re in.”
Steve looked at the last man. “And I’ll always fight. But you gotta do one
thing for me.”
“And what’s that?” Steve sat back in his chair comfortably.
The man drained his beer. “Open a tab.”
Steve chuckled and gathered the glasses. That he could do. He bought another
round for the men and went to the other side of the bar to where Bucky was
nursing a glass of whisky.
“See? I told you. They’re all idiots.” Bucky was smiling, but Steve could tell
that he was still tense. He sat on the other side of Bucky.
“How about you?” His hand automatically covered Bucky’s casually. “You ready to
follow ‘Captain America’ into the jaws of death?”
Bucky grinned and shifted his fingers under Steve’s hand. “Hell no.” Bucky gave
a grim smile and leant into Steve’s side. “That little Alpha from Brooklyn that
was too… dumb to run away from a fight? I’m following him.” Bucky flipped his
hand over and pushed his fingers through Steve’s. “But you’re keeping the
outfit, right?”
Steve looked across the bar to where there was a poster listing the session
times that he was supposed to be performing in. There was a sticker across it
that declared them all ‘cancelled until further notice’. Steve smiled at the
poster. He looked, quite frankly, ridiculous, in that woollen getup, but it was
distinctive. “You know what? It’s kind of growing on me.”
“Good.” Bucky picked up his glass and took a sip.
“Did you know you smell weird?” Steve reached over with his free hand and
patted Bucky’s head.
“No.” Bucky hummed and toyed with his glass on the bench. “What's weird about
it?”
Steve pressed his nose to Bucky’s hair and smelt. “Warm, sweet. You…” The
singing in the next room stopped, and that was the first time that Steve was
aware that there was music. Both he and Bucky leant back at the same time to
look into the other room.
Bucky stiffened under his arm, and Steve guiltily retracted it.
“Agent Carter!” He slid off his barstool, and felt Bucky do the same next to
him. He ducked his head and did his best to respect Peggy’s superior position.
“Well, they’re a right fun lot, aren’t they?” She tilted her head in the
direction of the other room and Steve shrugged.
“I trust them, they get the job done.”
“I certainly hope they will.”
Bucky cleared his throat quietly, his fingers scraping the hem of Steve’s
jacket impatiently. Peggy ignored him, staring right as Steve instead. He felt
the urge to twitch away and put Bucky between them, like he always used to when
an Omega stared at him too hard. He didn’t, he just stared back and held
himself stock-still. Maybe he would spontaneously combust and that would
definitely save him from her intense stare. It was staring to become really,
very uncomfortable, with Bucky—his mate, a Beta—on one side, and Peggy,
beautiful, strong, independent, Omega, on the other.
“Well, I guess I’ll see you tomorrow then.” She finally broke the silence, and
turned away with a swish of her tail.
“Oh my god.” Bucky scratched the back of his head. “I’m a Beta, and she didn’t
even see me.”
Steve smiled and turned so he could put his hand on Bucky’s head. “You know
rank doesn’t matter to her, right?”
For some reason, he didn’t think that Bucky was in anyway placated.

They went to the mainland of Europe straight away.
What Steve remembered of Europe most vividly wasn’t the explosions, or the
running or the fighting or the cold harsh nights, but rather the little things.
There were five men that Steve took with him, not counting Bucky, and each of
them came to play an important part in Steve’s life.
Dum Dum Dugan was tall, broad, and as strong and as stubborn as an ox. It was
many a time that Steve and he butted heads, it was only natural for that to
occur when there were two strong male Alphas in one pack. Dum Dum was good with
most weapons, not so much revolvers and the like, but shotguns, explosives,
knifes, vehicles, he was generally good, but not excellent, but he was still
useful, and extremely loyal after the first few fistfights Steve had beat him
at.
The second Alpha was James Falsworth. He was less concerned with leading, and
was more content with light, playful banter with the other men. He didn’t get
on so well with the French Omega, Jacques Dernier, to begin with, and they
never bonded over time, Jacques was already bonded, Steve could smell it, but
when the nights got cold and lonely, they would still share a tent, and no one
ever said anything lest the next time they returned to London, James got
arrested.
Steve always had Bucky, but without an Omega in heat, he never felt the need
for anything more than a warm something to have nearby.
The last two men were both Betas; there was Gabe Jones, the man with dark skin
and who spoke three languages, and Jim Morita, half-Japanese, and spoke enough
of the language to be able to slip them past outposts when needed.
Everything was unusual, they coordinated perfectly, slid around each other in
and out of combat, Steve had a pack. The word felt heavy and odd on his tongue,
and every time it passed through his mind, it felt like there was a weight in
his chest, substantial and warm, made him feel a little more real and whole,
but he
still felt empty on occasion, like a part of him was elsewhere and no matter
what he did, he never could find what he was missing.
They became the Howling Commandos, the name more of a joke than anything to
begin with, Gabe and Dum Dum were more comfortable with their instincts, and
sometimes were prone to actually howling when they succeeded. It was a nice,
surreal feeling that made the hairs on the back of his neck stand up, and none
of them can resist joining, letting their voices range through the trees and
fire as eerie, unbroken cries of victory.
Steve remembered the little things the best, quiet moments in front of the
fire, packs of cards, makeshift baseballs and singed rabbit legs for food.
“So we’re fifty miles out?” Steve and James were pouring over their maps,
trying to decide if it was best to go over the mountains, under them, or right
around.
“Lineally, but if we follow the road it’s closer to ninety, even a hundred
miles.”
“That will take us too long.”
“If we follow the road until we get to the train tracks, and then head directly
north, we can cut it down to seventy, I’d think. Unless we catch a plane or get
us a truck, we won’t get there any closer to a week.”
Steve tapped his fingers on the maps for a moment, and sighed. “Alright. The
road, then north.” He tapped once more, a little harder, and stood to return to
the fireside.
Dum Dum and Jim were folded over each other, Jim mostly asleep, and Dum Dum
cleaning his gun with a pipe between his teeth. Jacques was leaning on Jim’s
legs, talking to Gabe in the language they shared, Steve was almost certain it
was French, what little words they spoke were flowing and soft, and their hands
and bodies said more than their throats.
Steve didn’t understand a bloody word.
Bucky was leaning against a stump, knees tucked to his chest, his eyes
worryingly dark. Steve sat next to him, and took a deep breath.
Something smelt wrong, he noticed, there was more than the harsh pine scent and
the smoke, followed by the underlying muskiness of three Alphas in such close
quarters. No, there was a hint of sickly sweetness, and a touch of bitterness
that made the saccharine aroma that much more prominent.
Bucky looked up at him, and he looked unsure for a change. “Steve, I…” He
frowned, and looked back at his toes. “I don’t feel well.”
Steve put an arm over Bucky, pulled him close and Bucky complied, falling lax
in Steve’s grip so quickly that he slipped and ended up laying half over
Steve’s legs.
“I’m going to get some air.” Bucky stood as quickly as he had fallen into
Steve, and Steve stood as well.
“I’ll come with you.”
Steve kept his eyes trained on Bucky, and now that he was looking for it, Bucky
did seem a bit pasty, and sweat was beading at his temples. Bucky nodded
quickly and led him away from the fire, not too far, but enough so the smoky
smell and the murmuring voices were nearly gone, leaving them alone with their
thoughts.
“Shit.” Bucky hissed and unzipped his snow jacket, pulled it off hastily. It
was suddenly hot and his skin was crawling under his clothes despite the soft,
downy snow that crunched under their feet, and fell through the thick tree
cover.
“Bucky?” Steve asked, reaching out to place his hand on Bucky’s shoulder. Bucky
flinched when Steve touched him, and he couldn’t concentrate on anything but
the way his stomach way cramping up with need, and how the rest of his body
flushed hot and heavy. He choked on his next breath when Steve stepped closer,
smelling perfect and strong and…
“Bucky, is everything alright?” Steve’s voice turned demanding, Capitan-esque,
and Bucky answered without thinking, or really, consenting his body to speak.
“I… fuck, Steve, it’s hot and bright and everything hurts.” Small whimpers
escaped his throat, and he wanted so much to touch Steve, feel his warmth and
be filled by it, any way possible.
“It’s alright, I’ll try to—” Steve was cut off when Jacques entered their small
clearing abruptly, eyes wide and panicked.
Steve automatically stood in front of Bucky and snarled, angry and loud.
Jacques stepped back, ducked his head in submission, but didn’t leave.
He said something in French, hurried, hysterical, his movements and voice not
flowing and soft like usual, rather jerky and harsh, and then curled over with
a soft, choked sob, clutching his stomach as he dashed off.
Steve didn’t try to make anything of it. Bucky was pawing insistently at
Steve’s lower back, so he took a deep, steadying breath to level his head, to
clear away the aggression that had just overtaken him, but got a lungful of
Omega heat pheromones, and a belly full of lust instead.
He whirled and grabbed Bucky quickly; not thinking of consequences, in his
defence this had just been sprung on him, and pushed the man against the
closest tree even as he pressed his lips to Bucky’s sloppily. Bucky moaned and
arched into him, clutching at Steve’s shoulders tightly.
In return, Steve lifted Bucky, his fingers digging into the softer flesh on
either side of what was left of Bucky’s tail, and ground their hips together,
Bucky’s legs now locked around his waist. Steve doesn’t spare much thought
after that. He fumbles with his pants, Bucky’s too, and even he can’t miss the
dampness on Bucky’s legs.
It doesn’t cross Steve’s mind once that it’s wrong for Bucky’s body to be
producing any form of slick lubrication, and instead, trailed the fingers of
one hand to the source of the lubricant, fighting slightly with the canvas of
Bucky’s pants, and had to put Bucky down to remove them properly before
continuing. It was easy for Steve to work two, and then three fingers into
Bucky’s body, and his cock jerked, he could feel it spurt a splash of pre-come
against his wrist, when he felt Bucky’s ass twitch around his fingers.
Bucky just moaned and writhed and whimpered encouragement into Steve’s ear,
begs for more and harder and more.
Steve fucked Bucky for the first time against a conifer in the snow, their pack
hardly twenty yards away, his pants hardly past his hips, and Bucky hardly
better. It was desperate and rough and carnal, and Bucky shouted and was noisy
and his breath hitched in Steve’s ear when he came, semen dribbling out of his
cock sluggishly. Bucky tightened around Steve, and he could only press in
harder and faster to reach his own end, scraping Bucky’s back against the rough
pine bark, and they both felt themselves shuddering when Bucky was suddenly far
tighter around Steve’s cock than before.
Steve leant in more, thinking less about physiology and more about how good it
felt to have Bucky tight around the base of his cock, and one sharp thrust
later he was coming, his body twitching in short, aborted thrusts against
Bucky’s.
He sunk to his knees, keeping Bucky pinned to the tree, his mouth and teeth
working a bruise into Bucky’s left shoulder, and when he felt up to moving a
minute or two later, he found that he couldn’t remove himself from Bucky.
It wasn’t a mental thing, he physically couldn’t move.
Bucky didn’t seem to notice—he was shivering slightly, and gasping into Steve’s
neck—but it bothered Steve.
“Bucky, Bucky wait.”
“What?” Bucky made a half-assed attempt to look at Steve, but couldn’t do much
more than head butt Steve lightly.
“I can’t move.”
“Don't care,” he licked Steve’s neck, “feels good.”
Steve pushed at Bucky and tried moving again. He felt vulnerable, and felt the
need to protect Bucky, but he couldn’t see around, his back was presented to
the clearing.
“Stop.” Bucky grumbled. “I’ll bet you’ve knotted. Or didn't you ever get the
birds and the bees talk?”
Steve tried to lift Bucky again.
“Fucking hell, stop it. It hurts. You’ve killed the mood.” He sounded
rightfully pissed off now. “It’s not going to go away for a while. The pack
won’t let anything near us. Just relax and kiss me.”
True to Bucky’s words, Steve slid out of Bucky of his own accord about fifteen
minutes later.
Steve sat back, and buttoned his pants up. As if the pack didn't know what they
had been doing. Ugh. Will be doing. If the way that the flush in Bucky’s cheeks
hasn’t subsided is suggesting anything. Why had he even bothered making himself
presentable?
“Okay. That was great.” Bucky shifted and scraped his nails through the coarse
hair through his groin. “But I’m sitting in a snowdrift and there are sticks
poking into my ass. Can we go back to the tents? Preferably before the next
heat hits?”
Steve just scooped Bucky up in one swift movement, and stood. He carried the
brunet back to the tents, and all Bucky could do was make grabby hands over
Steve’s shoulder with a plaintive cry of; “My pants!”
Bucky started whimpering not long after they sealed themselves in Steve’s tent.
Well, their tent. They were frustrated and angry sounds, and Bucky looked like
he’s going to cry in his vexation. Steve undressed himself rather quickly.
“You know, I think I liked being Beta better.” Bucky grumbled. He was pulling
the rest of his clothes off, one eye on Steve, probably to make sure that he
didn’t leave.
“This might just be a left over thing from your phase?” Steve offered. It was a
weak argument. Schmidt’s scientist had done something to Bucky. Something
terrible.
“Bullshit.” He flopped across the sleeping bag, feet falling into Steven’s lap
haphazardly.
“How are you feeling?”
“Warm, mostly. I think I’m going to bruise.” He reached down to pull at the
skin at the top of his thigh, where Steve had been gripping him.
“Tell me when you need a hand again.”
“You should know when, Mr I-can-smell-an-Omega-in-heat-three-blocks-down.”
Steve grumbled in reply, soft and miffed. Bucky snorted.
“Well considering that you seem to lack a refractory period, can you just fuck
me through the interim?” Bucky pushed himself up onto his knees and waggled his
arse in the air. His tail flicked impatiently.
Steve grabbed his hips and dragged him closer. “I can do that.” He dropped his
head to bite at Bucky’s back, drawing red lines under the skin with his teeth.
They couldn’t really be subtle when it came to scent, so they didn’t even try
when it came to sound. Steve held his waist tightly and curled over Bucky
protectively, and fucked him until they’re both sweaty and slick and half
sobbing from exhaustion, whilst he promised things the whole time.
Next time, this’ll be so much better, we’ll know next time, I’ll make it so
good for you, next time, next time. Next time.
The first few rounds, it’s energetic, frequent, and they’re both left with
bruises. Bucky wasn’t quite as tireless as Steve, and slumped into the sleeping
bag whilst Steve held his hips up and drowned himself in the clench and tug of
Bucky’s body, the Omega moaning pathetically beneath him. They fell asleep with
Steve knotted inside Bucky, and woke in the early hours of the next morning,
Bucky working his hand frantically over his cock.
Steve didn’t stop him, just reached out and touched, covered as much of Bucky’s
leg as he could with his hand, and dug his fingers in when Bucky groaned in
resignation and gave up, used the points of contact as leverage to spread his
legs and pull him closer, up, and Bucky went without a fight. He took it slower
this time—the rest of the pack would be sleeping and they had to be ready to
travel at the drop of a hat—and he was fairly sure Bucky appreciated the
notion. Steve might heal bruises quickly, but the other certainly didn’t.
He took his time, worshiped Bucky’s body, every joint, muscle, tendon, hair. He
traced his fingers, feather light, across the lines where moonlight filtered
through the trees and the holes in the top of the tent, leaving wispy flickers
of white on his skin. Followed them with his lips.
Bucky’s shoulders were still broad and strong, muscles playing smoothly from
neck to clavicle to deltoid. The dip in his spine was still apparent, and Steve
ran his fingers along it, the palm of his hand skating across skin that was as
rough and scarred as it was soft. From there, Bucky got softer, more deposits
of fat over his hips, not much, there wasn’t much, not enough to eat to get
fat, but enough to bruise without hindering movement, enough to stop harsh
grips from damaging muscle against bone.
It was there that he gripped, pulled Bucky closer and further up, so he was
sitting in his lap, put one hand between his sturdy shoulders for support,
pressed up, into him carefully. Bucky’s exhalation was slightly stuttered, and
he sagged against Steve, head bowed so his breath ruffled Steve’s already
messed hair. He put his lips to Bucky’s throat, and rocked up.
Bucky made a small sound like he was dying, and Steve didn’t stop.

Luckily, the rest of his pack had enough tact not to mention anything three
days later, when Steve emerged from his tent, naked and reeking of sex. He was
planning to burn his clothes, they were unsalvageable and even if they were,
the scent was too strong to hide, and would make tracking them very easy. He
dropped them in the fire, just near the edge so as not to put the flames out,
took one of the billycans and a cloth, and ducked back into his tent.
They moved off in an hour.

Bucky was flinchy when Jacques next went into heat, expecting his own, but it
never happened. He spent sleepless nights sitting in Steve’s lap, both of them
listening to Jacques’ wracked sobs and moans, waiting for Bucky to feel dizzy
and hot, and for the slickness to start filling him up, prepared for his mate.
They were forced to conclude three weeks after Jacques’ heat finished that
Bucky’s just wasn’t going to come, and they stopped expecting it, and they
didn’t worry because heats were erratic when the body is just starting to have
them. Either that or that Bucky’s first heat might’ve been a freak of nature,
one off thing.
It didn’t really occur to them that Bucky didn’t need to go into heat anymore,
that his body didn’t need to go into heat again.
Not for the next six months, at least.

It was supposed to be simple. They would board the train, capture the Beta
scientist, and wring any and all information from him.
Hopefully find a cure for Bucky.
It was only natural that it didn’t turn out so simple.
Bucky had to…
Fuck.
The one time Bucky had to give in to his instincts, to protect his Alpha, was
the one time that Steve would never want Bucky to do anything but run and hide,
save himself, because Steve didn’t raze a factory to save Bucky for falling out
of a speeding train.
It took every fibre of his being to keep clinging to the iron bar on the train,
rather than follow Bucky, rather than let go and fall with him. There was a lot
of snow. Maybe they would survive, Steve could keep Bucky alive and they’d get
out of this.
Everything seemed surreal after he pulled himself back into the train. He
didn’t want to close his eyes, because every time he did, he could only see
Bucky.
He tried not to think, just let his body move for him, he picked his shield up,
and moved himself away from the edge. He stepped over the fallen boxes and the
body of the Hydra soldier, and walked in a dead straight line right up to the
engine room.
Gabe was standing at the controls, fiddling with levers and buttons quickly.
The beta glanced back the moment Steve’s door slid open, and went back to work
when he knew it wasn’t a threat. The train had to be stopped before it got to
its destination and only Gabe could read German.
The scientist was handcuffed and sitting on the floor, scowling around
aggressively. Steve resisted the urge to push him over with a foot so he was
lying on the floor, submitting, and instead strode straight forwards so he was
standing by Gabe’s side.
It didn’t take long for the brakes to start screeching, and Gabe stepped away
from the controls and looked around expectantly.
“Where’s Barnes?”
Steve dropped his shield, and didn’t realise until it clanged loudly on the
floor. “He… he fell.”
Gabe had the sense not to say anything, and Steve rested his back against the
console and slid to the floor beside his shield.

The bar was silent around him, and it made the sound of the bottle against the
table seem that much louder. Steve couldn’t focus on much else aside for the
burn of the liquor as it slid down his throat. If he thought of anything else,
he would think, undoubtedly of Bucky, and he would break something else.
He didn’t see how burnt and damaged the bar was around him—victim to the air
raids—and he certainly didn’t see Peggy enter, too preoccupied by his
distraction to notice.
He didn’t want to deal with himself. As an Alpha, he failed his team, failed
his mate, and therefore himself.
A pack’s Alpha was supposed to protect everyone in the pack as a whole, at all
costs. A mate’s Alpha was supposed to protect the Omega at the cost of his own
life. It was the sole purpose of an Alpha, to protect, and ensure that his pack
would be able to remain on after he was gone. It was easier to replace an Alpha
than it was an Omega, because an Alpha was always looking to increase the size
of their pack, but Omegas were content to remain under their Alpha in most
circumstances.
The sole purpose of an Alpha therefore, was to protect.
And he failed spectacularly.
Not only did he fail to protect his Omega, even if they were unbonded, it
didn’t matter, but he failed to protect his Omega who was more than likely
pregnant.
The liquor scalded and slid down his throat, and he was disappointed because
two full bottles of scotch and he wasn’t even slightly buzzed.
He drank and he drank and drank, until his throat didn’t hurt anymore.
He drank until he couldn’t recall the scent of Bucky’s heat, until he couldn’t
recognise the grain of the timber, but that could be the film of wetness in his
eyes.
He only half talks to Peggy. She talks about respect and Bucky a bit, and she
sounded a little jealous, but he can’t remember half of what she said. Not when
he’s got half a mind to pull her close and drown himself in her smell, and the
other half to break the bottle between his hands.

Truth be told, he doesn’t think about the things after that day. The others
tread around him as if he’s going to break. He wouldn’t, but he just lost his
mate. It’s expected behaviour.
He chased Schmidt. If there was one other person who held the blame for Bucky’s
death, it was he.
Schmidt was sucked into a Void by that blue cube. The brightness burnt Steve’s
eyes, and even as he did as he said, and crashed the plane into the water, that
luminous blue square was still too bright in his eyes.
 
When he wakes up, it’s gone.
***** Interlude *****
And so was everything else.
***** Apostasy *****
Chapter Notes
     If you have a thing against non-con/underage stuff, back away now.
     Skip this whole chapter. Seriously. Tony’s like, fifteen, and there’s
     mentions of him doing sexual stuff when he was nine. Nothing
     important really happens anyway. Just read up until Tony gets to the
     party. Yeah. I’ma shut up now.
     Also the HTML wasn't working too well, so the breaks are not larger
     gaps. They're fun symbols instead.
See the end of the chapter for more notes
1985
Tony hated oppression.
It's not like he asked to be the way he was, weak, inferior, Omega. That word,
that label had snapped at his heels since he was able to talk. Every time he
misbehaved, or things didn't go the way dad wanted them to go, he'd get sneered
at, get compared to Steve fucking Rogers, who dad still bloody mourned over
since he crash landed that plane, a good twenty five years prior to Tony's
birth, fifteen years ago. Now, he was studying three courses full time at MIT
to get out of the house and the oppression from his father, and things had been
all right up till now, but now...
Tony groaned and pulled his doona tighter around himself, He was sweating and
shivering and his whole body ached to the bone, and this had been the day he
had been dreading since he was three, and was old enough to understand what his
father was calling him.
It was this that made him weak, that made every Omega on earth weak in the eyes
of everyone else; the few crippling days a few crippling times a year, that all
he wanted, now he thought about it, was more. Just more.
Oh God he knew why they called them heats now.
He was burning up on the inside, sweltering under the doona, but he has already
kicked it off once, and that just made it worse, so here he was; stuck in his
bed, pretty much paralysed by his own biology. He had hardly been able to draw
the vials of blood from his arm when he managed to get back to his dorm. He
might be one of the most socially inept people of the decade, but even he knew
when to draw a line, and that was an Omega's heat. It was an incredibly
personal thing to ask about an Omega's heat cycles, and even more personal to
ask for fluid samples from an Omega in heat.
So Tony had to wait for his own, devastating, first heat in order to get his
precious samples. His purpose? Creating a more efficient suppressant. Because
there was no way he was going to skip out of class as a result of faulty
suppressants, or worse, have his status questioned. It was nice, having
everyone automatically assume that he was an Alpha, and with his temperament,
it was easy to back up.
As of the moment, there were three people alive that knew of his status. Howard
Stark, Maria Stark, and Virginia 'Pepper' Potts.
Pepper was his assistant, and also, coincidentally, an Alpha. Not his Alpha,
no, they hadn't imprinted yet, or they were both too stubborn to notice if they
had. No, Pepper was just an Alpha, and he was just a genius, soon to be (once
his dad died) billionaire, extremely promiscuous, Omega. Not exactly special,
but if he could create, and convince his father to market these suppressant
pills once he made it, he might be able to finally gain his father's respect.
Reliant suppressant pills would revolutionize war efforts. Omegas wouldn't have
to be tagged, and pulled out of duty if their pills failed to work, which was
beginning to happen more and more often, actually, the number of suppressant
failures were rising at an alarming rate, but this new suppressant that Tony
was hoping to develop would replace the faulty medication, and maybe make his
father think that he had some use after all.
And he wouldn't have to skip class.
And he really needed a phone that could talk to him so he wouldn't have to get
out of bed to make a call.
There were a lot of things he needed.
Right now, he actually needed a wash, but before that, he needed help and a
phone call.
Not necessarily in that order.
The first try of reaching for his phone resulted in him knocking it to the
floor. The second attempt worked a bit better, and he pulled it under the
covers and pressed buttons in hopefully the right order to call Pepper.
"Hello?"
Aww yeah.
Well calling an Alpha might work a little better if the sound of an Alpha’s
voice wasn't going to turn his brain into mush. What was left of it, anyway.
"Hey Pepper,"
"Are you feeling okay?"
"What? Why would you be asking that? Unless there's some flu going around.
Actually, if there is please hang up now. I'll find a way to the lab to get
Dumm-e to do it.” Dumm-e was his prototype mechanical assistant, actually, it
was his thesis project, but getting past that, Dumm-e would help him, even if
he did make a mistake here or there.
But going to Dumm-e meant getting out of bed, and walking and he didn’t think
his legs would support his weight, oh, and he reeked of pheromones. He was
lucky that he didn’t have the nearest Alpha banging on his dorm door.
“There’s no flu. You just never say hi to me when you call. You just launch
into whatever stupid idea you have. So what is it this time?”
“Do you own any pegs?”
“Yes. Is it safe for me to ask why?”
“Bring one and come to my dorm. I need your help.” And he hung up, before
pulling the doona closer to his bare skin.
Pepper took exactly eighteen minutes to get to his dorm, eighteen, slow,
torturous minutes. She didn’t bother knocking, she just unlocked the door and
let herself in. Rude. Well, she was helping Tony, so he could let it slide.
Pepper clutched the door handle tightly the moment she was inside the room, and
covered the lower half of her face with her hand, pinching her nose shut.
“Right.” She kept her voice as even as possible. “Peg.” She closed the door,
and walked straight past Tony to open the window. “Could you perhaps have told
me that you were in heat? No, I suppose that would have ‘ruined the surprise’.
What do you need me for?”
“I’m collecting fluid samples to manufacture an effective suppressant.” Tony
poked his nose out of the blanket, and nearly moaned when he could smell the
faint Alpha on Pepper through his own pheromones. “I’ve got enough blood, but I
can’t get anything else and it’s pissing me off!” His voice rose to a pitiful,
childish whine by the end of the sentence, Pepper rolled her eyes, and shoved
her head out the window.
“Define ‘anything else’.”
“You know what I mean.” Tony grumbled. He squirmed and rubbed the heel of his
palm over his hard cock. But really, that just made things worse.
“You will owe me so much for this favour.”
“I’ll never skip a class again.” Tony promised. “Look, I’ll even stop wanting
to kill myself every time Howard brings up Captain America and I’ll try to stop
drinking.”
Pepper closed the window and stripped her pullover off.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Two hours later, Tony was stretched out on the hardwood floor, a small jar, one
of several, concealing his view of the ceiling. The jar was half full of semen.
He shook it a little, and set it down by his hip, and picked up a different
jar. This one was filled with a viscous, translucent liquid.
He found it to be a curiosity that Omegas were able to produce a form of
lubrication, but Biology wasn’t his thing. He would put up with the whims of
biological science for just long enough to produce these suppressant pills and
that was it.
Pepper was laying on her back next to him, half-asleep, and probably exhausted.
She would be able to go back to whatever class she had now. Tony had his pure
fluid samples now; he could just drink the remainder of his lust away.
He got to his feet, a little unsteady, and collected his specimen jars and put
them in the fridge with his blood samples in the egg rack. He was moderately
certain that everything would stay fresh enough at 6˚C (42.8˚F) for a few days.
Then he could move them to a proper storage facility at the college. Like the
specimen fridges in the Biology rooms.
He found some clothes and hissed when he pulled a baggy shirt over his head.
His skin flared against the soft cotton, and the rest of his body flared
against Pepper’s scent, which had permeated the room. He went straight back to
the fridge and reached inside for a bottle of beer. He cracked the cap off
against the fridge shelf and tilted the bottle back.
“I thought you were going to stop.” She was giving him a disapproving look. He
just knew it.
Tony ‘mmf-ed’ around the neck of the bottle, and righted it. “I didn’t say
when.” He tilted the rim of the bottle at her before pressing it back to his
mouth.
Pepper sighed.
“Thanks for the help.” Tony walked across the room and pressed the power button
for his computer.
Pepper instantly recognised the dismissal, and went about collecting her
clothes. “I’ll be back in a few days.”
“Sure.” Tony replied and gave a wave, but Pepper already knew he wasn’t fully
there, more focused on the casually glitching screen in front of him.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Tony managed to escape his first heat with minimal consequences. He crawled
back to bed after a few days, well and truly drunk, feeling like he was going
to throw up, but he hadn’t eaten for four days, so there was nothing to throw
up. Once he recovered, he rang and bought pizza, ate the whole thing and then
showered. He was not leaving his room smelling like he hadn’t done anything but
jerk off and play computer games (Galaga, in fact) for four days.
Okay, so he totally had, but he was never going to admit it, so he wasn’t
leaving without having a shower first.
After that, he shuffled to the fridge, collected his samples, and shuffled
across campus to the science department in his AC/DC shirt and blue flannel
pyjamas. His tail was still wet and dripping water everywhere, and he hadn’t
bothered shaving the fine layer of stubble away, but he really didn’t care.
Like, really, didn’t care. People didn’t even bother giving him an odd look as
he picked his way across the campus. They were all too used to his unusual
behaviour and hours, and considering that it was the middle of the night, there
was no one about to give him a weird look. When he got to the science
department, he realised he left his key card in his dorm.
Shit.
He set his collection of jars on the ground and rubbed his eyes before
examining the machine that unlocked the door. He deemed it useless to try to
hack the doors open. For one, there were no buttons, and he didn’t have a
screwdriver. He picked up his jars and checked the windows.
He finally found one that was left unlocked, and scrambled through it.
Satisfied with that, he trotted down the dark hall and into the biology lab.
Tony made it to the following evening without being disturbed. Well, disturbed
by Pepper. He had been getting students and teachers flowing in and out of the
lab since seven A.M., and he was getting the occasional hot flush, just the
last remnants of his heat leaving his body, but nothing desperate.
Pepper strutted into the lab at five in the afternoon, and sat on a bench,
clearly fuming at something, probably him, but he dismissed that. That was
normal. After a while, he waved her over to the microscope he was peering down,
and wheeled his chair out of the way so she could have a look.
“I’ve dyed the cells. This is my blood from today. Now, if I just swap these
around…” he groaned when he stretched over the microscope and swapped the two
slides. “That’s my blood from four days ago. See how there’s light and dark
patches? During a heat, there’s a higher white blood cell count. I’m yet to
check that weird lube stuff, but I think it’s mostly composed of excess blood
plasma.”
Pepper leant away from the microscope. “You know this means nothing to me,
right?”
“Omegas go into heat and get really fucking horny and can’t get as much oxygen
to their brains because there’s less plasma and red blood cells.”
“Interesting.”
“It’s a literal health hazard. If they do too much exercise, especially in that
first heat, they could get brain damage.” He pressed his eyes back to the
microscope and fiddled with the fine focus knob. “So do you need me for
anything?”
Pepper didn’t reply for a moment, and Tony scribbled down a few numbers on a
jotter pad by his elbow. “Your father is hosting a function, and he is
requesting your presence.”
Tony’s fingers tightened around the pencil he was holding, and his tail
drooped. “When?”
“Tonight. In three hours.”
Tony jerked the slide out of the microscope and quickly packed everything away.
“Thanks for the heads up.”
“You were in full heat when the invitation arrived. I needed you with a clear
head before I told you.” Pepper followed him out of the lab, and back to his
dorm. “There is a set of clothes on the bed,” Pepper crossed the room and
pushed the window open to air the room. Four days of Tony holing himself up in
there really made the room reek. Tony squirmed and went to the fridge.
“No.” Pepper grabbed his wrist and forced him into the bathroom. “You will wash
and shave. Mr Stark wants you sober for this.”
“All the more reason for me to get smashed!” Tony kicked the door and flicked
the shower on. He emerged thirty minutes later in a towel with a toothbrush in
his mouth to Pepper sitting at his desk writing in a folder.
“Get dressed.” She didn’t look up.
“C’mere.” Tony swallowed the toothpaste foam, put the toothbrush on the bench,
and approached Pepper. He had decided that he had encountered a slight hitch.
See, it wasn’t common knowledge that he was an Omega, and now, just after his
heat, he smelt like one more than ever. It was easy to pass off when in the
lab. One night stand, left before she woke, etcetera, etcetera. But now,
showing up at a public function, his father would never let him live it down if
he didn’t maintain all appearances, including scent. Now that he had his heat,
his scent wasn’t bland and neutral, and he couldn’t just dash on some cologne
and hide it.
“What?” Pepper turned the chair around.
“Just hold still.” Tony reached out to her neck and she tensed, ears
flattening. He froze until she relaxed, and rubbed the glands in her neck
through her skin. The effect was pretty instantaneous, and the glands released
pheromones. Tony rubbed what skin of her neck he could reach, and then rubbed
his hands over his body, and repeated until he was certain that he didn’t smell
like an Omega any more.
“Will that be all, Anthony?”
“That will be all, Miss Potts.” Pepper stood and left, and Tony scrambled to
the fridge.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
The function was held on the fifth floor of the Stark Industries tower.
At the function, Tony was all smiles. Sure, he had drunk enough hard liquor to
knock any other person off their feet, but he had practice with this.
Pepper knew he was drunk, Howard knew he was drunk, luckily his mother was
still under the impression that Tony wouldn’t do such a thing, so he was
currently sticking with her to hide from his father. It was that or the
cloakroom, and it was warm out here, so here he was.
Stuck trying to appease his father when he knew that it was already a lost
cause.
His mother caught a glass of champagne from a passing waiter, and Tony smoothed
his hands over his jacket to stop them twitching towards the flutes of alcohol.
He wasn’t nearly drunk enough to be here, in his opinion, but he wasn’t going
to ruin what little affection he got from his mother.
Pepper was by his side, her planner tucked under her arm. She looked
spectacular, and like she belonged here far more than he did, her dress
shimmering just a hint in the light, enough to show off the smooth lines of her
body. Her hair was swept up loosely at the nape of her neck, and her ears and
tail appeared floppy, relaxed. If Tony didn’t know her as well as he did, he’d
actually believe that she was entirely calm, laughing politely along with some
senator who was just trying to get on the Stark Industries board.
“Anthony!” Tony winced when someone clapped him on the shoulder, and turned to
face the man quickly. “It’s good to see you again.”
“Justin, a pleasure.” Tony forced a smile at the older man, Alpha, and stood as
tall as he could. Justin Hammer was fifteen years older than Tony, and was
running Stark Industries’ main rival company, H.A.M.M.E.R. Industries. For a
guy who’s supposed to be a genius, he sure wasn’t good at figuring out a more
original name.
As far as Tony’s list of ‘people I hate’ went, Justin was right near the top,
just below his father.
And Captain America. But that was different.
“So what do you want?” Tony tried to take the venom out of his words. He really
did.
“I just wanted to hear how the prodigal son was doing!”
“The prodigal son is doing just fine. Now if you’ll just excuse me, I think my
father needs me.”
Yeah, he was doing just fine. Except the part where he was drunk and hating the
world because to it, that’s all he was. The prodigal son of Howard Stark.
He made his way halfway across the room in the direction of his father, and
then lost himself in the crowd, totally unaware that Pepper was following. She
caught up quickly, minus her planner, and insisted that he come to the dance
floor, and tucked her hands around his neck.
“Tony, you need to calm down.” She had her hands in the back of his hair, near
the nape of his neck, and in her heels, she was definitely taller than him, but
she was an Alpha, and she did have three years on him. He put his hands on her
hips, dangerously low, and smirked up at her, pressing his façade. “I’m
serious.” She tightened her fingers, and Tony dug into her hips to hide the
wince. “Anger will bring out your pheromones, and the last thing your father
wants is for you to end up mated to a rival company.”
True anger did flare up in him then, and he pressed himself closer to Pepper in
hopes that her scent would mask his. Just in case she was right.
“It’s not like he’s been getting me to do pretty much the same thing for six
years.” Tony kept his voice low, so only Pepper could hear him.
Pepper’s eyes darkened, but her stance didn’t change. She was nearly as good at
hiding her true feelings as Tony was. She knew exactly what Howard was getting
Tony to do for the company behind closed doors, and she didn’t like it.
“That’s why I’m not ever going to mate.” Well, mate to an Alpha.
“What if you bond to one?”
“I trust you not to screw me over.”
“Tony, I’m serious.”
“I’ll tell them to fuck themselves. It’s not going to happen.”
“What about…”
“There’s a difference between mating, and getting you to help me jerk off.”
Tony sniggered. Pepper rolled her eyes. Tony could be such a child sometimes.
Tony rested his cheek on Pepper’s shoulder, and the conversation ended.
“Why don’t I take you outside for a breath of air?” Pepper eventually decided
that it wasn’t good for Tony to be stuck in a room full of adults under his
father’s watchful eye, and Tony readily agreed, and let her lead him to the
balcony.
Naturally, only the worst could happen from there.
“Son, could you please come here and meet Senator Dickerson.”
Tony froze, and Pepper nearly bumped into him. Her hand was on his shoulder
immediately, giving it an encouraging squeeze. Tony plastered a smile to his
face, and turned around, making a show of pushing his hair back. “Senator, it’s
an honour to meet you.” Tony took the offered hand, and forced himself to
appear delighted to meet the senator. He knew what came next, and he didn’t
like it.
Pepper was already gone. Tony refused to allow her to stay around when he
talked to his father at functions because the result was always the same, and
he knew that Pepper wouldn’t hesitate to jump to his defence.
It was her job.
The senator was taller than both himself and Howard, blond, not overly broad,
and dressed in a dark blue suit that didn’t quite fit properly. Tony could
automatically tell that he wasn’t extremely important, but he clearly had some
use to Howard, otherwise he wouldn’t even be talking to the senator.
“Tony, would you care to show Senator Dickerson around?” Howard used his ‘no-
bullshit’ voice, and Tony couldn’t help but lower his head a little.
“Yes, father.” He smiled up at the senator, and decided that there was no way
he would ever be drunk enough for this. “Senator?”
Whilst Stark Tower was mostly offices and tech labs, Howard had a full set of
apartments in the top floors, more penthouse type things, but Tony thought that
he’d rather not end up with bruised knees.
Yeah, because carpet burn was that much less painful.
Tony was a master at awkward silences, and when they got in the elevator, he
drew it out, perfectly content to let the senator fidget uncomfortably. But his
short reign of power was over once the elevator arrived on floor sixty. He had
a routine, bought about by years of practice. Swallowing his pride, he sank to
his knees on the carpet in the middle of the room, head bowed, and waited.
Physical abuse, he found he could handle. Bruises faded, cuts healed, bones
set, and the coppery taste mixed with a hint of bitterness could be washed
away. It was the verbal abuse that he found the worst, it stuck in his brain,
repeated over and over, stuck on loop. If it wasn’t bad enough that he wasn’t
considered worthy of his father’s time, then it was worse that strangers would
abuse him, tell him that the only good thing about him was his body, broken as
it was already, and slowly, he came to think the same time, which was the only
reason he didn’t fight back now that he knew what he was doing was both illegal
and immoral.
“Such a good boy.” The senator’s hand gripped his hair, pinching one of his
ears—probably not deliberately, but it hurt anyway—and pulled his head back.
He let his happen, muscles loose, and he kept his gaze even and calm. Nothing
the senator could do would surprise him anymore.
The senator’s words didn’t strike much of a chord in him. He had been called
worse, dog, mutt, bitch, although really, could they be more creative? Their
closest non-human relatives were dogs and wolves. Not much of a derogatory term
anymore.
Tony let a lazy smile slide across his face, the senator was probably too
stupid to realise that Tony just didn’t care anymore, and he nearly let out a
crazy giggle at that thought. A sharp crack rang out in the room, and Tony
could only gasp at the flare of pain in his cheek. He turned his head back to
look at the senator again. He didn’t break eye contact. If he was going to get
beaten around like a common whore, he was doing it on his terms. The fingers in
his hair tightened, and then pushed him away roughly. He fell backwards, to the
floor, and a heavy foot crashed into his ribs. Good. He was getting to the
senator. He would smile to himself, but he got slapped last time that happened.
“Don’t look at me.” The foot pressed down, compressing his chest, and Tony
fought to breathe in, and coughed when he couldn’t. He wet his lips, and forced
his gaze up to the ceiling. Now he knew what the senator wanted.
One sentence, and he knew. The senator was a Beta. Tony could smell that. He
was a rather desperate Beta, and just wanted to be the one dominating the
situation for a change, and who better to go to than the ‘Alpha’ whose father
whores out to companies to seal the deal?
Because it’s so much better to say that you dominated an Alpha.
The foot was lifted off his chest and he sucked air into his lungs. He could
hear the jingle of a belt, and the rustle of fabric as clothing was pushed out
of the way, but he didn’t move. He didn’t want to get hit again.
His father always looked so disappointed when he came back with bruises. As if
it were Tony’s fault.
The senator didn’t mind that Tony didn’t move, perhaps this was what he wanted,
and straddled Tony’s chest. The crotch of the senator’s pants was stretched
tight and pressed into his neck, and before the hard cock was pressed into his
mouth he was already struggling for breath. The senator leant forwards,
planting his hands above Tony’s head, caging him in. Tony refused to panic, and
hollowed his cheeks to suck on the flesh in his mouth. The man was already
leaking pre-come, and it trickled down the back of his throat, bitter on his
tongue, and he gagged on the taste slightly.
He tilted his head back a little, reluctant to expose his neck, but it would
mean he would gag less when the hard length hit the back of his throat as the
senator thrust down into his mouth.
It really hurt, to be used this way. His ribs ached, his brain screamed for
oxygen, and he could only pray that the senator finished soon, otherwise he was
in actual danger of passing out. His chest panged from holding the tears and
breath in, his head too, for the same reason, and because underneath the
carpet, no matter how thick and soft it was, the floor was made of concrete,
and his skull had hit the ground hard enough for him to see stars when he was
thrown to it.
The senator pulled back before he passed out, and Tony realised that the
senator knew that Tony hadn’t been able to breathe, with seventy kilos (155lbs)
pressed on his chest, and his throat cut off with the fabric, bastard!, and
instead came in short spurts over Tony’s face. Tony closed his eyes, and choked
a sob down. Senator Dickerson tucked himself back in after using Tony’s shirt
to wipe his softening cock dry, and left Tony shivering there, doing his best
not to let tears slip down his face.
He shakily picked himself back up when he felt that he could, silently thanked
the Gods (if they existed, not that he believed in them, but he felt the need
to thank something) that he didn’t have to have sex this time, and quickly
stripped his jacket, tie and shirt off, and used his shirt to wipe himself
clean. Pepper didn’t show up, for which he was grateful. He didn’t need her to
try and make him feel better.
On his way to the bathroom, he passed a liquor cabinet. He didn’t even try to
stop himself, and just grabbed a bottle of whiskey. He wasn’t drunk enough for
this.
One look in the mirror was enough to tell him that his ribs were going to
bruise, as was his throat, and there was a neat red handprint on the side of
his face. He wasn’t sure how he was going to go back downstairs and face his
father, and the crowd, even though he was fairly sure that he’d probably done
favours for more than half of it, whether sexual or intellectual.
He took a mouthful of liquor; it hurt to swallow, before splashing cold water
on his face to the speed the fading of the slap mark. He found a fresh shirt,
two sizes too big, but he honestly hadn’t wanted to be here in the first place.
If anyone were going to complain, he’d direct him or her to his father to take
the blame. He buttoned the shirt to the top to hide the blossoming bruise.
Three mouthfuls of whiskey later, and Pepper finally showed up, just as he was
trying to work his tie. She pushed his hands out of the way and fiddled for a
minute and then tugged it straight, and Tony started rummaging through the
bathroom cupboards to find a toothbrush, or at least toothpaste.
He found neither, and settled for getting rid of the musky and bitter taste
from his mouth by drowning it away with alcohol, before smoothing his hair back
into place. The gel in it had cracked now, and it wouldn’t be perfect, but
there wasn’t anything he could do about it except wet his hand and comb it back
with his fingers, and hope that it held.
He silently returned the bottle to the cabinet, and had to grip the wooden
frame tightly when he started to feel the effects of the additional alcohol. He
adjusted, and let Pepper take him downstairs.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
It didn’t take him long to figure out a chemical formula that would act as an
effective suppressant, and he emailed it and the rest of his findings to his
father after he tested it on himself. The making the suppressant bit was quick.
The waiting for his next heat wasn’t.
He waited a full six months before he could feel the edges of lust in his
brain, and he quickly excused himself from class, not that the teacher would
mind, and drank the vial that would supposedly contain enough of his diluted
chemical to hide the effects, at the least, of the heat.
The effect was pretty instantaneous, his head cleared, and he could almost feel
his body stop producing pheromones. Well, sex pheromones. He still had the rest
of them, communication, fear, anger. He let out a whoop in joy and grabbed a
beer to celebrate, and emailed everything to his father right then.
Three weeks later, he returned to his dorm room after a marathon of tinkering
with Dumm-E’s circuitry to find a box sitting on his kitchen bench. The little
robot had a nasty habit of knocking things over. Just a delay in the optical to
movement sensors, but he couldn’t seem to fix it.
He opened the box and found several foil and plastic packets. Each one fit in
the palm of his hand, and contained twenty-eight capsules of his chemical. He
smiled. Research and Development had been quick on this one. He inspected the
packets, and then read the note that was lying flat in the bottom of the box.
R&D looked into the formula you sent. It seems to act as an effective
suppressant on all test subjects…
“Well of course it fucking does. I made it.”
…the medication needs to be taken once a day, every day, and will effectively
suppress hormones and pheromones for the duration of a heat. This will be very
useful if the cold war ever comes to a head.
Howard.
Tony crumpled the paper up and tossed it towards his waste paper basket.
“You’re welcome, dad.”
He went to the fridge.
Chapter End Notes
     Haha I'm horrible.
     I REGRET NOTHING.
     It's essential for character development and the rest of the story.
     I know jack shit about MIT, so I’m just going to say that there’s a
     campus in NY, and be done with it. That’s how he got from University
     to Stark Tower within three hours.
***** Iconoclast *****
Chapter Summary
     This was his freedom now, to do what he wanted, with who he wanted,
     including easily impressionable, barely legal, Omegas. Because hey,
     he might not have been impressionable, but he certainly hadn't been
     legal.
Chapter Notes
     Short crappy chapter, but it'll do as a filler in a pinch.
     Things are looking up =)
     Also, the HTML hates me. It's just the between-clause gaps, which are
     larger, so we'll make do!
1988-2009
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
“And that’s why you can’t run the company.”
Tony put his chin on the desk. He didn’t want to run the company. He wanted to
go home, get smashed and forget whom he was. “Yeah, cool.”
“Tony, you will receive your full inheritance, including the company when you
turn twenty-one, but for now you are simply one of its assets.”
Tony tapped his fingers on the table, and his ears drooped. He was an asset of
Stark Industries, of which Obadiah Stane was acting CEO. He swallowed when
Stane put a heavy hand on his shoulder.
“We have to do what’s best for the company.”
Of course. He was foolish to think that now his father was dead—car accident—he
wouldn’t have to use his specific methods of persuasion. He tried to brace
himself. He didn’t want to be an asset of SI in this manner, but he knew, the
moment Obadiah’s fingers pressed through his hair firmly, that he had no
choice.
Besides, he was only doing what was best for the company, and that was all he
had left now.
“What do you want me to do?” He slipped out from under Obadiah’s hand, and slid
his chair across the carpet a few inches.
“Good boy, Tony.”
Tony stood when he was allowed, and left. Pepper, who had been waiting outside
the door whilst he got told what he could and couldn’t do, followed him
closely, her heels clicking on the linoleum floor as they walked.
“Thank God that’s over.” Tony grumbled.
“You know I hate to make you do things. But we can’t go home yet.”
Tony whined in displeasure. He hated doing things.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Okay, when he said that he hated doing things, things meant work that was
boring. He was fine with tinkering in his workshop, and he was fine with
drowning his worries about being an asset of Stark Industries by treading the
thin line between alcohol abuse, and flat out alcoholism, and through sex.
The sex part was his favourite. He might be an Omega, but so far, only Pepper
and Stane knew, and he planned to keep it that way. No, he would just pick up
the drunkest Beta or Omega, and take them home, and through the use of an
amazing thing called technology, (and maybe because they were drunk, they
didn’t notice), he always managed to get away with acting Alpha, and he was in
his workshop by morning. He felt a little bad (not really, not at all), for
leaving Pepper to usher them out the door in the mornings, but being able to
claim, or at least pretend to claim others for a night did him wonders, and
helped him get through the three years of being Stark Industries’ most valuable
asset until he received his inheritance, including the company.
The first thing he did when he turned twenty-one was clear out his father’s old
office. He was tempted to burn everything, all the records, certificates,
ornaments, the desk, chair, the plaque on the door, the door but didn’t.
Pepper took the desk and the chair off his hands, sold them, Tony told her to
keep the profits, and then she let Tony burn everything but the company
records.
She confiscated those.
Tony set to work immediately. He got a new desk, well, Pepper got him a new
desk, and immediately set about updating everything in the tower. Computers,
the internet connection, the whole methods of communication in the tower. He
hated answering stupid questions, and so opted for e-mails to replace
everything.
The thing was, it worked. The board of directors were happy about it, but Tony
could tell that they didn’t like receiving orders from a twenty-one year old.
He built another robot, similar to Dumm-e, but with a slightly more advanced
interface, for the tower, to help him in his midnight stints when he wasn’t in
California and christened it Butterfingers, (Once he finished his degree at MIT
he had moved Dumm-e out to the Stark house in Malibu), and, just to spite
everyone, especially the ones who said he couldn’t do it, he built an AI, and
lovingly named it Jarvis, after the old butler who had pretty much acted as his
father until his untimely death when Tony was eight.
That particular project took even him several years to complete, but now that
he was CEO of Stark Industries, he suddenly had a heap of time that used to be
spent convincing various senators and business rivals to just listen to Howard
and Obadiah.
It was quickly filled with (more consensual) sex, booze and inventing.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
"Hey babe," Tony looked up from his glass of scotch and the cards before him at
the young-ish man who just placed two chips by his elbow, "you know they force
me to lose if too many people bet on me." He offered one of his trademark grins
and swilled his drink in its glass.
The boy, for that was what he was, a child, probably nineteen, if that, smiled
nervously, and Tony leant back and pressed his cheek into the boys arm,
twisting his head to smell him. Omega, nowhere near due for a heat, and-Tony
glanced up-attractive, too, neat blond hair, slightly rounded jaw, full lips
which kept disappearing behind nervous teeth, and shy hazel eyes, and just the
right amount of puppy fat around his hips. His grin amplified. Shy ones were
easiest and took less effort to convince because they asked less questions.
"Stick around a bit," he said, "I'll make it worth your while." He knocked back
the rest of his drink and returned his attention to the now inconsequential
game, and raised the stakes. Someone threw their cards in and left, someone
else folded, and the last person stubbornly waited.
Five minutes later, he was all but dragging the Omega across the room towards
the front doors. He threw a thumbs up to Pepper as he passed, and she
absolutely didn't snarl at him as he left.
"Here," his car was waiting, and he offered a wink to the valet (probably
beta), and pulled the passenger door open for the blonde. He jumped behind the
wheel and pulled away from the curb. He hummed to himself as he drove, an
instinctual response to the wind in his hair and the stars above him, and the
Omega shivered. He didn't think about how Pepper would hound him tomorrow
morning about irresponsibility and taking advantage, when they both knew that
this was nothing compared to what he was and is subjected to. This was his
freedom now, to do what he wanted, with who he wanted, including easily
impressionable, barely legal, Omegas. Because hey, he might not have been
impressionable, but he certainly hadn't been legal.
He pulled up in his garage and slid out comfortably, waving Dumm-E away from
the gaping boy, and pulled him over to the stairs eagerly. He wasn't worried
about security breaches because Jarvis would have identified the kid already.
He grabbed the Omega once they were on flat ground again, one hand on each side
of his head, and kissed him greedily. His whole act pivoted around how
demanding he could be, how much like an Alpha could he be.
It was a fair bit, if he was being modest.
The boy put his hands on Tony's waist awkwardly, and Tony snarled and pressed
his fangs into his bottom lip in warning. Rule one of acting like an Alpha; you
controlled everything. He shuddered and moaned in response, and Tony scratched
his scalp gently in reward.
It couldn't be said that he was a cruel Alpha.
Tony stripped his jacket and bow tie off, and started pulling at the kid's
shirt impatiently when he just stood there dumbstruck. He got the hint pretty
quickly, and Tony pulled him along to the nearest bed, stripping clothes off as
they went.
He didn't give the kid time to look at him before crowding him onto the bed,
and used his teeth to draw lines down his spine, and his fingers to press
between his legs, the tips finding his hole. Tony bit gently, and sucked a mark
just above one cheek and smirked.
"You’re so good. I can already feel how wet you're getting for me.” He pressed
his teeth against the meat of the kid’s arse and pressed his fingers right
inside.
Sex was a mundane way to rebel, but it works well enough.
And fuck, it was fun.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
He knew that they didn’t approve, even though the quality of work at SI hadn’t
changed one dot, or rather, it had improved, but it could never match the
growing reputation of its CEO.
He knew there were better ways to defy his father, even in death, but the thing
was, he liked being CEO of SI, and if he did a 180 and declared that he was an
Omega, he would lose the company. No doubt about it.
It was one thing for an Omega to run a general store, and quite another for one
to be running the leading weapons manufacturing company on the planet.
Not to mention the ridiculous number of people he would piss off.
At least no one could take the company away from him in any capacity. If they
found out that he was Omega and declared it to the public, then Tony could sue
them for oh, slander, maybe?
He’d still have to be tested, because something like that is a pretty serious
accusation, but he could find some way to bypass that. Right? He’d have to ask
Pepper. Pepper could do anything. He, on the other hand, could not.
Yes, he was admitting that. To himself, if not out loud.
See? He was maturing.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Everything was fine and dandy, in fact, right up until Obadiah suggested that
he go to Afghanistan to sell the Jericho missiles, eighteen years later. He
gladly went. He was actually becoming sick of the flashy lifestyle, not that it
wasn’t amusing. Well, not sick of it. He just wanted to get away from it all.
Just have a bit of a break, so he didn’t have to put up all fronts all the
time.
Maybe it wasn’t the best idea.
Either that, or it was the best idea ever.
Well, that’s what he told Pepper. And why wouldn’t she believe him? He came
back with the armour and a way to put SI back on the great path. Or to forge a
new one.
He’ll settle for it being a bit of both.
***** Woo Notes and pictures! Yay fun times *****
I sobbed over this for an hour trying to make it all work. Theoretical genetics
is hard. I hope you can read it. The fancy letters (I got bored and was having
fun) are all 'X' and 'Y'
[http://24.media.tumblr.com/0d618481d747cd62b6feff7db4dda6ba/
tumblr_mm0npzL0fL1rf8ckvo1_500.png]
I will add more images later as I finish them.
***** Bastardise *****
Chapter Summary
     “What happened?”
     “You became unconscious.”
     “No, not that.” James shifts under the gaze of his shrink who doesn’t
     stop asking unusual questions. His shoulder aches. “What happened
     before that? I can remember things, I was bonded. I was pregnant.
     What happened? Because there’s nothing now.”
     “Your mate abandoned you, James, you have been told this.”
     “No one would ever abandon a bond mate!” He roars.
Chapter Notes
     Sorry this bit’s in present tense. I’m likely to slip in and out as
     the story progresses because I’m writing a Thorki (And a Clint/
     Coulson) fic right now that’s all in present tense and it’s screwing
     with my head and I personally like the tense. It’s nicer.
     Translations in end notes
See the end of the chapter for more notes
1944-2007
There isn’t even a beeping machine. He thinks he might be dead. Should be dead.
But it hurts too much to be dead, everyone says it’s so peaceful, death. He
draws in a shuddering breath, and even that hurts. He opens his eyes, pain.
It’s the bright kind of pain; literally, he can see the sky, and the sun is
reflecting off the clouds and the snow and it’s all white, piercing, burning,
except where his blood cuts gashes in the rime, aching wounds that match the
ones he can feel in his left side and back, head, legs, he’s lacerated all
over.
Maybe it's a hospital room. It smells clean enough. It’s white enough. But it’s
too quiet. No beeping machines. And it’s cold.
So.
He’s outside. His eyes have adjusted, there’s a large splotch of black near his
feet, rocks, then. Rocks and snow. Big rocks, mountainous rocks, and snow.
Where the hell is he?
He clenches his fingers into the ground, and it gives easily, the cold burning
the skin of his right hand, but he can’t feel his left. He’s probably going to
lose the fingers to frostbite if he can’t feel them. How long was he out?
He’s hungry, so at least four (five?) hours.
He aches inside, too. He’s lost something important, can’t fell bits of
himself. Important bits. He can’t feel the rough press of Someone’s life
against his own, and it’s left this great big hole in his stomach that aches to
be filled with something more substantial than his unborn child, although he’d
be lucky to keep it at this rate. (And yes, he knew he had been pregnant and
hadn’t told that Someone (he can’t remember the name for the life of him). He
wasn’t going to let that idiot waste his life on something stupid simply
because he had been pulled from duty.
Wait.
Where is Someone?
Why is he at the bottom of a dirty great chasm without Someone by his side?
He lifts a hand to rub the last of the sleep from his eyes, and it comes away
damp. He coughs, laughs without emotion.
God. What was he thinking, putting so much of himself in Someone’s hands? If he
can’t remember them, then they mustn’t’ve been a very good mate.
He puts his hands on the ground by his waist, pushes himself up so he’s
sitting, except maybe his left hand is more numb than he thought it was,
because he slips right over and lands on his side, raw flesh pressing into
already bloody snow, and he growls in pain when it erupts in agony. He squints
his eyes open again against the harshly bleached landscape, sunspots in his
vision.
There’s something more than blood in the snow. He tilts his head to make sense
of it. When he understands the gentle slope of a thumb, it all falls into
place.
There’s an arm in the snow. Just a human arm, ripped clean off at the shoulder
socket, he can see the sleek curve of the ball of the humerus where it peeks
out of shredded muscle and skin. ‘That’s an odd thing to be laying about in the
snow’, he thinks calmly, ‘someone will be missing it.’
He rolls over and manages to sit up properly, feels a bit dizzy, and looks
around. There’s a lot of blood. Some chunks of skin here and there, the arm. A
lot of rocks and snow. He thinks that he should find a cave or something to
sleep in, because it’s cold now, but it’ll be very much sub-zero at night, and
probably windy, and he should have some matches or something. Maybe he’ll find
a tree and could light a fire.
He also thinks, that before he goes anywhere, he should check how badly he’s
injured. He feels a bit woozy now, what if he stands and faints? That’ll get
him nowhere in a big hurry.
He starts with his feet, because they're easiest to reach and look at. His
boots are intact, which are nice. He wriggles his toes, and thinks that only
two or three are broken. Which is also nice. His legs seem alright, only a
little banged up, and his right femur is possibly cracked, but he won’t know
for sure until he puts weight on it, so instead he puts a handful of snow over
where the bruising is to stop it from swelling too much.
This snow stuff is handy.
His hips are perfectly fine, his tail’s broken in two places, but not
important, the pain from that is mostly from frostbite. Shame. He likes having
a tail. There are a few cuts and scrapes on his stomach, and he feels somewhat
nauseous, and the skin from his navel right around the left side is a nasty
shade of purple, the kind of purple you get when you’ve got really bad internal
haemorrhaging. He dares not poke it. Just in case he’s right.
His chest has a large gash that extends from sternum to the right side of his
neck, ragged at the edges, but the bleeding has stopped.
He lifts his hands to look at them, and only one comes up. He glances to his
left, and there’s nothing there. His hand…
He feels bile rise in his throat and rolls himself onto his side so he doesn’t
throw up on his legs. That arm, just a few yards away. It’s his.
He rolls back and falls to the ground, and promptly blacks out.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
When he next wakes, there are beeping machines. He tries to lift his hand to
rub his eyes, but there’s a strap around the wrist, and he can’t move it. He
tenses, and jerks it as hard as he can, and the strap snaps with a satisfying
crack. He rubs his eyes, and sits up. He doesn’t get dizzy.
He’s bandaged a lot, and he swings his legs off the side of the bed, and has to
awkwardly hunch over to use his teeth to rip the drip out. It slips and leaves
a gash, which hurts, but doesn’t bleed much, which is odd, but really not a
priority. Last he remembers, he was lying in the bottom of a chasm, bleeding
out because he lost an arm. Now he’s in a hospital, which for a hospital is
pretty quiet, actually. It’s still a hospital-ly hospital, with white and sinks
and curtains and the horrid smell of bleach and death, but where are the sounds
of people walking past, the low hum of far away voices?
He slides off the bed and pulls the bandages wrapped around his stomach away
enough for him to peek underneath. The ugly bruising is gone. How long ago was
the chasm? Chasm. Where did that come from?
He backtracks in his mind, and panics a little when he can’t remember anything,
at all.
He turns sharply when he hears a noise behind himself, and dog tags clink
against each other as they bounce away from his skin. He itches to look at
them, learn his name, know who he is, know why he even has dog tags, but there
is a man standing inside the curtain with him, wearing a yellow hazmat suit,
helmet and all.
He isn’t given a chance to say anything, ask any questions, before a gun is
levelled at his chest, and he’s shot with a small dart.
Suddenly, the floor’s quite comfortable.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
He’s slapped into awareness by a tall man holding a needle filled with a clear
liquid. He’s back on the gurney, strapped down across his chest and legs this
time, too. “Hast du gut geschlafen?”(1)
He snarls and struggles away. He really does try.
A shorter man with glasses appears behind the first man. “Please don’t anger
him, he is all that remains of my old research, and is so far my greatest
success.” The short man says, probably in English for his benefit, heavy accent
and all. The tall man scowls and hands the needle over with what seems like
great reluctance. He is addressed next. “Welcome, James Barnes. My name is
Doctor Zola. I do apologise for your treatment, but it’s for your own safety, I
promise. The less you move, the less chance I have of accidentally
desensitizing your entire chest to pain.”
“What are you doing?” His voice is ragged from lack of use.
“This is just a continuation of your development.” The contents of the needle
are ejected into the IV in his arm. It’s cold and burns when it goes into his
blood stream. “It is both a shame and an advantage that there has been complete
separation of the arm from the scapula. I will have to fit a new shoulder joint
and integrate it to the bones of the shoulder before it can be replaced.
However the super-soldier serum that is already in your body will ensue that
melding of the adamantium and bone will be efficient and non-toxic.”
What? They were going to do what? “Forgive me, but, what?”
“I will have to reinforce, and even replace parts of your shoulder with a metal
called adamantium in order to fit a new arm. The metal is toxic to humans,
however I was able to gather recent information of a procedure to bind
adamantium to the skeleton of a being called Weapon X. It seems that biological
regeneration at a rate faster than that of a normal human is essential for this
procedure to work.” The man waved the taller person back over, and he came with
a tray, and assortment of tools on its surface. He closed his eyes when he saw
sharp things, to calm himself. These people are trying to help him. They are
giving him a whole new arm without asking for anything (not that he had
anything anymore) in return. “I have already given you cocaine for the pain,
and I will give you more in an hour, but you must be conscious for this, so I
don’t do any further permanent damage to your body. I really do wish it was
some other way.”
The doctor takes something off the tray, he could hear it clatter, and he
grunts when he feels a needle press into the skin of his shoulder, deeper,
deeper-he permits a yell to escape his throat, not that he had a choice in the
matter, when he feels the tip dig into what bone is left in his shoulder. A
second, and then a third needle follow the first, in different places. He
briefly wonders how needles are going to help bind metal to bone, but then it
feels like his entire shoulder is on fire, or melting, and there’s the smell of
burning flesh, and he’s screaming himself hoarse, fingers scrabbling against
the stainless steel of the gurney.
He is fortunate enough to black out.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
“What happened?”
“You became unconscious.”
James is sitting in a chair, and he’s more or less certain that he’s never felt
more… shit, in his life. He’s been awake for less than an hour, and he’s
already had about six blood tests done, and he’s been grilled by a shrink.
“No, not that.” James shifts under the gaze of said shrink who doesn’t stop
asking unusual questions. His shoulder aches. “What happened before that? I can
remember things, I was bonded. I was pregnant. What happened? Because there’s
nothing now.”
“Your mate abandoned you, James, you have been told this.”
“No one would ever abandon a bond mate!” He roars, rising in his seat. He takes
a breath in, shuddering in his sudden anger. He feels hollow now, despite the
extra weight from the adamantium, like someone’s carved everything out of his
chest and replaced it with cotton wool. He sits back down when the anger
suddenly drains, and he’s so tired. “What about my child?” He did notice that
they didn’t mention that at all, even though he’s asked too many times to
count. He knows he’s not carrying it anymore, call it a… mother’s instinct. He
shivers. That’s a weird thought.
“It lives.”
“It?” He doesn’t even have the energy to get angry that he’s been lied to about
something so important. He can't even be indignant that they're calling his
child an 'it'.
“This is an unusual case, James. You will get it when we can know that it is
safe.”
“Safe?” He echoes. “What could possibly-”
“Now is not the time for that, James. We will explain what is happening with
your child when the occasion arises. The more pressing matter is that your mate
abandoned you. Does this not make you angry?”
“No.” He doesn’t really feel anything. He can’t even remember their name,
what’s the point?
“Do you want to be angry about it?”
“No.”
“Then how do you feel about it?”
He thinks about it, comes up blank when the only thing he remembers about his
mate are the dog tags around his neck, which have been confiscated until
further notice, actually, and the fact that they had something to do with him
waking up lying in the snow with his own arm a few feet away. “I don’t feel
anything about that.” It’s probably the most truthful thing he’s said all day.
It kind of scares him. Just a little.
“What about for your child then? It wasn’t just you who was abandoned. Your
mate didn’t even care that you were with child, he left you anyway, probably
knowing full well that you wouldn’t survive.”
Bucky thought about that, and found himself agreeing with the psychologist.
What person would ditch their own kid, even with a reason?
“We promise that we’ll find out who it was, and we’ll help you find them.”
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
“We’re just going to put you in a trance, okay James? To see if your
subconscious can remember anything.”
“Okay.” He clasps his hands together, feels the elegant curve of cold metal
twined between the fingers of his right hand, and the soft press of human flesh
between the fingers of his left.
“So, if you could just relax, and close your eyes for me.”
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
“Is it just me, or is my subconscious really stupid?”
“Your mental blocks are thicker than we anticipated, so more digging is
required than usual.”
He’s sitting in the shrink’s chair again, waiting patiently to be put in a
trance again. He doesn’t really mind too much, things happen when he’s in a
trance, and he wakes up anywhere between an hour, to a week later. It’s nice,
it makes him forget what he’s lost, but also makes him hyperaware of what he’s
leaving behind, his child, who he had seen twice now, a beautiful little girl
with short, fiery tufts of hair. What was worrying was that each time she was
suspended in a glass tube, attached to so many tubes and wires that Bucky could
hardly see her.
“Can I spend time with my daughter when I wake up, please?”
“Yes, you can. She will actually reach the date she was due to be born in three
days, so we will make sure that you are awake by then.”
“Thank you.”
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
He wakes up two days later, and he is given his dog tags back, as well as a set
of clothes that make it look like he’s been somewhere asides from a hospital in
the past month. He sits in the room they’ve given him, and looks at his dog
tags. One has his name on it, and he’s not surprised at that, but the other
belongs to a person called Steven G Rogers. Maybe that was the name of his
mate? It was likely, but that name wasn’t exactly a great help. Two and a half
billion people on earth, and he’s supposed to be looking for a Steven Rogers?
Yeah right.
“James?” There’s a soft knock on his door and he hastens to push the ID tags
under his clothing.
“Come in.”
The man comes in, wearing a lab coat and glasses and gloves and starts talking
to him. The words sound wrong and sharp, but his mind supplies words, makes the
sounds into coherent sentences. He replies without thinking, the man says
something else, and he snaps himself out of it enough to think that something’s
wrong.
“Why can I speak Russian?”
The man replies in the language. “Whilst you were in a trance, we fed you
information, a little bit at a time. You should be able to speak the most
common languages. There is also other necessary information that has been
implanted.”
This doesn’t freak him out as much as it should. If they’ve been feeding him
information, have they been getting him to do things?
“Oh,” he says instead, “alright.”
“You may see your daughter now, if you want.”
If he wants.
What a stupid thing to say.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
It’s funny, he thinks, how he’s put into trances and cryogenic machines and has
daily blood tests run on him, and it’s none of that that breaks him, rather
it’s… nothing.
One day he just falls to the floor, clutching his chest, screaming. It feels
like he’s been torn apart, frozen, set alight, everything. Just everything.
And nothing.
He’s aware of his daughter pushing him, but only just vaguely. It’s not
important. Something big has happened, someone’s not there anymore, but he
doesn’t even know who it is that isn’t there, so maybe that’s why he’s not
dead. Maybe he’s not dead because he’s still got his daughter to care for.
People come and very quickly stuff him back in his own body, force him into a
trance, and when he wakes up, he’s numb, but not dying.
His daughter barrels into his arms, holds him tightly to her body, and gives
him a stern telling off in Russian.
He knows she’s just worried.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
“Mat!” (1)
“Look at how you’ve grown, sweetie.” James coos to his daughter when she
launches herself into his arms. She’s a tiny child, and he lifts her easily so
she’s on his shoulders.
“I learnt how to break a man’s wrist yesterday.” She says proudly.
“Did you now?” He isn’t even surprised by this. Since he woke up, that’s all
his life has been, he doesn’t know any better, and so doesn’t expect anything
else.
“Yes!” She swings her legs lightly and they bounce off his chest. “You only
need ten kilograms of force if it is applied correctly.”
“So if you jump on their arm you might just break it, is that it then?” He
laughs when she slides backwards and flips to the ground. She kicks his shin.
“Alright, I’ve got to go see Dr Zola about my shoulder, it’s been aching
lately. Run along and learn how to break elbows, or whatever’s next.”
She giggles and tells him that it’s ankles, and he honestly fears for his life.
“Alright.” He stoops and kisses her bright red hair. “Have fun, Natasha.”
“Oh, I will.” She says sagely. She’s gone in a flash.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
“Whilst I am comfortable with going out on my own to the far reaches of
nowhere, I do however, draw a line when it comes to my daughter. She’s ten, I
will not send her out unsupervised.”
“What do you propose then?” They don’t argue with him. They learnt not to when
he refused to give up his dog tags again.
“I’ll go with her as back up. Once we are in Warsaw, I’ll stay in the safe
house, and she can do what she needs to do, but I’ll be there as a safety net
of sorts.”
He can tell that they know what he says is making sense. Natasha is nearly as
good as he is in technique, but she lacks experience. She needs someone to
nudge her in the right direction if she gets lost, but her stubbornness usually
means that she doesn’t just listen to anyone.
“Very well, you will both leave tomorrow.”
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
“Hmm,”
“What?”
“Can I say that it’s too quiet, or will that jinx us?”
“You tell me, you’re the one with forty years of undercover experience.”
“Oh, come on, we’ll say fifteen. Because if we’re logging all the time that we
were in cryo, then you’ve got forty too.”
“Thirty three, I didn’t start going into cryo until I was seven. They weren’t
sure what it’d do to my development, remember?” She has that ‘oh God, mum,
you’re so stupid’ tone, and James laughs.
“I’ll give that to you.” He pauses. “It’s too quiet.”
As if on cue, someone opens a car door, and the vehicle blows up. Rather
spectacularly.
“Oh yeah, you say something and it all goes to shit. Thanks mat.”
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
They share quarters, not for a lack of space, but for comfort and security.
Well, they share when they’re out of cryogenics.
“Hey Tash, do we know anyone called Steve?” The name rings a bell, a rather dim
one in the back of his mind, given, and it’s sort of on one of his dog tags.
“Not personally.” She sleeps on the bunk above him, because he tosses in his
sleep and has fallen out of bed before. She sleeps like a log. A very
sensitive, easy to wake log, given.
“Then who do we know that’s names Steve?”
“Captain America.” She says, as if it’s the most obvious thing on earth.
“Oh.” He fingers the tags with his left hand, hearing then clink against each
other. “I didn’t know that.”
“James!” She exclaims. “That was like, the first file I ever read.” The bunk
creaks as she shifts to look at him over the lip of the bed. “Rogers, Steven G.
Born July 4th 1914, service number 98-”
“Okay, I get it, you have a freaky good memory.” He pulls the tags off over his
head and passes them up to Natasha. “But this.”
“Oh.”
“That sounds about right.”
“You had-”
“Most likely.”
“With Captain America.”
“Apparently.”
“And the chances that he’s my sire are?”
“Well, you see, when people get amnesia, it tends not to skip things like sex
and other things like that just for the hell of it.”
“Just take a guess please?”
“Probably pretty high.”
“Neat.” She drops the tags onto his chest, and groans when she stretches out in
her bed. “Every kid’s fantasy to be Captain America’s kid, right?”
“Is it?”
“God, no. He’s dead, remember? Who wants a dead father?”
He might just chuckle at that a little.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
“That was some shot.”
He can’t deny that Natasha’s getting better than him—and catching up on him in
age.
“Not bad, I guess.” She’s also getting far too mature for his liking. Too…
serious. They’re sitting around waiting to go back into cryogenics; this is
their catch up time, now.
“Doesn’t any of this bother you?”
“Does a bird not fly south for winter because it simply feels like not doing
so?” She retorts. She won’t meet his eyes. “We know no better, mat. Of course
it bothers me. Setting a hospital on fire to kill one man? Unnecessary, and a
waste, completely unforgivable, but where would we turn if we left, even if we
could?”
James didn’t want to entertain the notion; she was right. “You have grown up so
quickly,” he says sadly, reaching out to hold her close. His breath ruffles her
hair when she relaxes into his grip, “for a girl who wasn’t supposed to be
born.”
Dr Zola appears in the doorway, and James thinks the man looks old and weary.
“It is time.”
They stand as one, and James nuzzles behind her clipped ear, presses a kiss to
the skin. “See you on the other side.”
“Ya tebya lyublyu.”(3)
“Me too, Tash.”
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
“Welcome back.” Natasha blinks her way into fluorescent lighting, flinching
against the harshness of it all. She should be used to this, she’s only been
doing it for nineteen years after all. “It is 2003. There are clothes and food
on the table over there.” She does a double take. Ten years. That’s probably
the longest gap she’s had.
“The cold war is over, with no major causalities.”
She looks around. She knows the room well. It’s as white as fresh snow, and
just as bright. There are three tables, she woke on one, one is empty, and the
third always has food and clothes on it. There is nothing else in the room save
for two doors, one leads to the rest of the facility, and the other to a supply
room that contains cleaning materials, weaponry, and medical supplies. “Where’s
James?” He was always in the room when she woke. He isn’t there.
“Please eat something, and then we can talk.”
She gets up, pulls a shirt over her head—they’re always next to naked when they
go into the cryo machine—and then picks up a piece of fruit, bites into it,
swallows, and then pins the scientist with her best death glare. He withers
under it, despite being twice her age.
He caves rather easily. “There was an emergency and we had to send him out into
the field, regrettably, he was killed.”
“Regrettably?” She somehow, manages to keep her throat clear. “My mother dies,
and all you can say about that is regrettable? How dare you?”
The man stutters, and flees the room.
“Natasha, you know by now that terrifying messengers is hardly satisfying.”
“It does me well enough.” She doesn’t even look at the man who’s talking to
her. She doesn’t particularly care.
“We have one last mission for you, and then we can supply you with whatever you
want, to do whatever you want with the rest of your life.”
“Why should I do it?”
“We have the means to make you do it even if you don’t accept.”
She weighs the outcomes. She highly doubts that they will let her go that
easily, but she could take off. She’s not leaving anyone behind this time, so
she has nothing to worry about. “Okay.”
“This is Drakoff, you know him. His daughter is about to make a breakthrough in
her branch of science, and it is not in the world’s best interest to know this
yet. You just need to kill her,” he hands her a manilla folder, “and make it
look like an accident.”
She opens the file and walks back to the table with the food, reaching for
something to bite into. Budapest. Interesting.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
“Govno.”(4) Killing Drakoff’s daughter was simple enough. In a lab there are so
many things to go wrong. So she switched a beaker of barium chloride for
sulphuric acid, could’ve happened to anyone.
But now she’s nose to nose with the pointy end of the stick—literally.
“Drop the gun.” The man at the other end of the stick says. She doesn’t see any
reason to argue.
“What are you waiting for?” She demands. There’s blood in her hair and bile in
her mouth, and she doesn’t care anymore. “Go on, shoot me.”
He still hesitates, and they’re running out of time; she can hear the wailing
of the police sirens and fire engines, and the arrow’s shaking between her
eyes.
“Do it!” She screams, she’s not sure which language it’s in, but he doesn’t do
it, he’s still in limbo, and she grabs the arrow and presses it forwards.
“Coward.” She spits. He jerks it out of her grip, slashing her hand open. He
has a hold of her arm, and is dragging her out of the hotel room, to the
stairs, and up and up and up.
They jump.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
“Dick head.”
“I prefer Clint, I think.”
“I prefer what I want.”
Chapter End Notes
     (1) German, lit. Have you good sleep, but that’s their grammar. Nice,
     huh? Basically asking Bucky if he had a good sleep, but not in the
     nice way. LIke, the tone of his voice would've been nasty, and he
     doesn't know Bucky, and uses 'du' which is the informal way of saying
     'you'. If you had a stranger over at your house, you would say "Haben
     Sie gut geschlafen?" GERMAN
     (2) Mat—Russian kid’s slang for mum or mother, because well…
     technically…
     (3) Ya tebya lyublyu—I love you (Because you can’t grow up in some
     weird psych ward without loving your own father… mother, whatever) If
     any of you can speak Russian better than Google translate, please
     tell me if this is wrong, and I’ll fix it.
     (4) Govno—shit, interjection
     Cocaine was used as a painkiller/local anaesthetic up until about
     1960, when they realised that it wasn’t too good for people and
     traded it for Opiates, like Heroin. Heroin is only available for use
     in hospitals and must have two people witness the administering of
     the drug (UK), Morphine and Codeine are still widely used. All four
     drugs are related, however only Codeine can be bought over the
     counter. Morphine must be prescribed, and only for special cases, and
     even then, it is rarely used outside clinics/hospitals.
     Note, this is an awful and cobbled together history of medicines
     through the ages, I just thought some of you might freak out when
     Zola said that he used Cocaine as a painkiller (which is stupid,
     because it was mostly used as local anaesthetic for nose/eye
     surgeries, and was used once or twice for spine operations in 1885.
     Maybe he knows something I don’t???)
***** Chapter 12 *****
Chapter Summary
     And finally, there’s Tony. Iron Man. It doesn’t matter either way.
     Long story short, Tony’s the most abrasive Alpha Steve’s ever met.
     It’s probably blasphemy for Steve to say that he wants him, but he
     does.
     Wants him for his team, wants him for himself. Maybe he’s ill. He
     shouldn’t want an Alpha.
Chapter Notes
     Because I have too many Steve feels. Sorry it's so short, I know I
     promised someone that this would be longer, but I couldn't edit it
     much because I liked it and it fit well and I had nothing to really
     expand on.
     Might be a bit of a wait until the next chapter, but it's funny and
     ridiculous and made purely because I felt like it.
See the end of the chapter for more notes
2011-2012
It took effort to get up in the mornings, in a way it never had. His alarm went
of, bright and cheery, but any sunlight seemed to fall short of the window.
He felt around for something, someone, as if he expected there to be someone
under the sheets with him, maybe he would say good morning, or hello to them,
coddle them up in his arms just because he could, but the rest of the bed is
cold, a harsh and unforgiving wasteland as always.
He didn't have the energy to be disappointed. He could only be glad that the
war was over; he didn't have to live in constant fear for his pack's life.
Days were positively dull. Time slipped through his fingers like sand from an
hourglass. One moment, he would pick up his paintbrush to spread something on
the canvas in front of him-what, he doesn't know. He can't seem to get it right
anymore-and the next, it's lunchtime, and he's done nothing, except drip paint
back onto his palette, and then he went to fetch lunch, and suddenly it was
night, and he's not hungry so he did eat, but he can't remember doing so, and
he sat at his kitchen table, and stared at photos of the howling Commandoes
until he woke with a snap and its two in the morning and he wasn't in bed. But
at least he wasn't crouching behind a rock until his ankles ached and his knees
locked up. At least the war was over.
He listened to the news in the morning on the radio, listened to the causal
fade and crackle, and listened to the weather. Snow was the forecast, the walk
to the shops won't be nice, but at least he's not camping in it. At least the
war was over.
The world continued to spin as if he wasn't there, as if his presence was
inconsequential, and it was. He's not an active participant anymore. He was a
shell, and he lacks purpose. So he sat on a park bench, and listened to the
bird song, let the time slip through his fingers and uselessly watched the
people walk past, all buried in their own little technological devices, hardly
looking a yard ahead. All the living are dead, he thought, everyone who
mattered, Bucky, the Commandoes.
And the dead are all living, these people in their little worlds, like zombies,
plodding about doing their things.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Apparently they won.
But at least the war was over.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
"Would you like a refill there?"
Steve glanced up from his cup, the dregs in the bottom that glistened dully in
the fluorescent cafe lighting. The pretty waitress that worked there everyday
but Wednesday and Saturday was standing there, holding a pot of coffee. He
pulled his jacket sleeve up a touch to check his watch. "No, sorry. I'll be
late for work if I do." His fingers itched to take her wrist and smell it, but
he still wasn't sure if that was done in this century.
It was ten to nine on a Monday morning. He really would love to stick around a
while longer, chat to the waitress-Ashley, her name was-and drink coffee, he's
got enough money to tip her, but if he does stay, he thinks too much, and it's
not good for him to think too much. And he'd actually be late for work. "Thanks
anyway." He picked his mug up and placed it on her tray, along with a few
dollars, resolved to come back in the afternoon and get and made his way
through the chairs and tables towards the road. He was instantly swept up by
the tide of people bustling to work, too busy to even pause and talk to a
waitress for ten minutes. Such inconsiderable behaviour irked him.
He jogged across the road, just catching the green light, and turned down the
next street and then immediately into (grocery store). He shed his jacket and
hung it up in the back room with his wallet in the pocket, and returned to the
cash registers.
"I'm not late, am I?" He slipped behind a register and logged in.
"Nah, quiet mornin' today." Mr Lee was sitting at the next register over. He
owned the store, and had for the last fifty years. He was one of the few (read;
the only) people Steve knew who had been alive before he went into the ice, and
that made Steve comfortable, because apparently there were tics from the
forties that not even someone who grew old through the decades could get rid
of, like scenting territory. The whole store smelt exactly like Mr Lee, and
that too, made Steve comfortable. It was familiar, safe, and warned anyone who
came in that tomfoolery would not be tolerated.
Most other shops he went into reeked of bleach and pine, and he hated it.
Steve liked working for Mr Lee, the work itself gave him a mundane way for him
to forget himself, the repetitiveness of the job giving him the opportune way
to immerse himself in the twenty first century without seeming unusual or rude
when approaching people for a conversation. The work also gave him a fair bit
of exercise, as everyone else working at the store were young kids, still
school age, too young to reach the top shelves, or in the case of Mr Lee and
his lovely wife, too old to stock shelves, it left Steve with literally all of
the heavy lifting, and he relished it. It was a quick job too, as he didn't
need a ladder to reach the top shelves.
But when it was just he and Mr Lee, it gave him an insight to what the war, and
he, was like to the eyes of a civilian.
"That's good." Steve stretched his arms behind his back, clasped them, and
raised them as high as he could before letting them go. "Do any shelves need
stocking?"
"Not now, but milk was walking out all weekend, so before you leave, just top
the fridges up for me, will you?"
"No problem."
"Also there'll be a delivery of perishables later this afternoon, and that'll
need to be packed into the cold room. 'M sure the delivery boys can handle it,
but its so much quicker when you give 'em a hand."
"That won't take long at all, sir."
"Oh, I'm 'sir' now, am I?"
"You've always been 'sir'."
"Not for a long time, kiddo."
"If it makes you feel better, neither have I."
Mr Lee laughed at that. "Good sense of humour you've got. Pups these days have
no respect, you know? Back in the good ol' days, yer could give a kid a good
hidin' if they gave you cheek, now, their parents try ter exorcise you if you
so much as try to tell them off."
"They don't even respect soldiers, either." He had seen far too many people
completely disregarding soldiers, taunting them even, at ceremonies, when they
should have nothing but the utmost respect for the Alphas, Betas and Omegas who
risk their lives and packs for their country.
"No, they don't." Mr Lee said sadly. "Are you a military man, Steven?"
"I used to be." Now, he's not too sure what he is. "What about you? You must've
been the right age to serve in World War Two." He paused, and then realised his
mistake. "Forgive me, that was rude."
"No, no. Not at all." Mr Lee waved it off casually. "I was a strapping young
lad of seventeen when the war started in '39. I turned eighteen later that
year, and I, like nearly every other idiot kid on the block, went down to that
enlistment tent to sign up. They nearly dismissed me on sight, and then did
dismiss me when they realised I had asthma." He shrugged and removed his
glasses to clean them. "I thought I'd give it another go, just one more, maybe
they'd have a use for a weedy little asthmatic. That was at the Stark expo in
'40, must've been a Sunday night. My mate thought I was crazy." He paused, and
Steve forced himself to nod.
He remembered that perfectly, but he wasn't eighteen, he was twenty-four, and
his mate thought that he was just as stupid.
"So I got in the tent, and this German Beta, why he was German still confuses
me, well he saw me, and he apologised, said I should've been there five minutes
ago. So I left, went home, and married Joan instead."
"I'm sorry." Steve murmured.
"What for? That was decades before you were even thought of! Besides, whenever
I feel a bit down, I just remember how I was five minutes late to becoming
Captain America!"
Despite himself, Steve smiled. "It can't have been that great, being Captain
America."
"Well, we all knew that, didn't we? But it was something that every young Alpha
dreamed of. He was the perfect specimen, wasn't he? Of course we wanted to be
him. That Omega of his, Dame Carter, must've been a lucky lass."
Steve bit his tongue to stop himself saying anything. Of course the world was
fed that idyllic image. It wouldn't have done for the Captain to have run off
with a male Beta now, would it?
"How old would he be, if he didn't die in '42?"
"Ninety eight." Steve didn't have to think about it. That fact was weighing
heavy on his mind. Two more years and he'd be a hundred, or was it twenty-
seven? He wasn't sure, but he knew he should be in college or something, not at
the beck and call of a super secret military organisation.
"Well, what do you know?" Mr Lee stretched his back a little and sagged in his
chair, and the glass sliding doors opened silently, letting in some of the
cold, late autumn wind. Steve automatically tensed and flicked his gaze up. It
was just a lady, come to do her shopping. Steve twitched in his seat. Customer.
There was a delay with the delivery van, so by the time Steve clocked off, it
was nearly seven, and he was sorely hoping for the cafe to be open. He thought
that Ashley might still be there. He declined pay for the four hours of
overtime, and took his groceries, what he received as pay instead of money-it
hadn't been hard to convince Mr Lee to do that, as trading was simpler than
paying then buying-zipped his jacket up, and headed around the corner to the
cafe.
Ashley wasn't there, but he bought a coffee to go and ducked into the
underground station just down the road.
Sometimes, he almost wished for something violent to happen, but during others,
mundane was nice.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Mundane was nice indeed.
He liked Director Fury. He really did. The man was straightforward and a little
old fashioned, and he didn't beat around the bush. He said what needed to be
done, and so Steve would do it.
Steve just hadn't been expecting to be put in an aeroplane with a slightly
obsessive Alpha who felt compelled for some reason or another to express his
admiration for Captain America, which was nice, but Steve was a different
person than he used to be. As Captain America, he had lost too many people. He
was amazed with himself that he could even consider a mission where putting the
suit on was a possibility, no matter how slim.
Certainly, he would do it if he was asked, he would do whatever was necessary
to save lives and his country, but that didn't mean that it was who he was
anymore, and he doubted that there was much that would change his mind.
It’s a debacle, the Loki Incident, but everything turns out okay. He’s given a
team, and they work together with varying degrees of compliancy. It’s not
perfect, but it’s better than what he expected for such a shamble of a team,
for a team that was literally thrown together at the last minute, full of
people who probably shouldn’t still be alive.
There’s Thor, who knows battle and knows command and knows how to take orders
like a soldier, and that’s good, because he does what he has to, and he does
what he’s told. Thor, who comes from another planet, worshipped as a god by
Northern Europe, from where the Cube came from. Loki’s brother.
Black Widow and Hawkeye are cut from the same fabric, they both smell like each
other, and they both have stupid ideas that get things done. At least they tell
Steve what they’re going to do.
Really, who gets Steve to launch them into the air and call it ‘fun’?
Who jumps off a building?
Who crashes a plane when he probably could’ve landed it? A small part of his
mind asks. Okay, so he can’t talk about stupid ideas.
Then there’s Bruce, who nearly breaks Fury’s ship accidentally, who’s more in
control of himself than anyone else Steve has met before. Bruce, who finds Loki
for them, and doesn’t feel the need to boast about it. Quiet, Beta Bruce.
Steve likes him already.
And finally, there’s Tony. Iron Man. It doesn’t matter either way. Long story
short, Tony’s the most abrasive Alpha Steve’s ever met. It’s probably blasphemy
for Steve to say that he wants him, but he does.
Wants him for his team, wants him for himself. Maybe he’s ill. He shouldn’t
want an Alpha.
Maybe he’s ill because Tony’s not a team player, not really. But, well. It’s
complicated.
All the best things are.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
The police in New York are arrogant, and don’t listen to him until they see him
knock out several of the aliens. They leap to follow his instructions then, and
he wonders what kind of backward century he’s in when a Beta doesn’t obey a
direct command from an Alpha for his own safety.
Steve doesn’t stop, he runs to the next thing.
He and Thor take out a squadron, and it’s the most alive Steve’s felt in
months. Maybe he should’ve suited up before this, just jumped back into the
fray. He hadn’t been afraid of fighting. He’d missed it.
The next thing he dealt with was where the Chitauri had invaded a coffee shop,
and he’s so turned around, so involved with what’s right in front of his nose,
that he doesn’t realise that it’s the one that he frequents until he’s inside
it.
He manages not to get blown up, gets thrown out a window, but he saves all the
people inside. One of the aliens leaps on his back and goes for the head, and
he struggles with it. They’re smaller than he is, but still very strong, with
an exoskeleton and long, thick fingers, and he temporarily sacrifices his cowl
to dislodge it. He takes a minute to catch his breath, calls for Thor on the
comm, and looks around at the damage. The top floor of the building had been
blown out, but otherwise it was unscathed. The people are emerging from the
building, and he’s about to tell them to get back inside until the fighting’s
over, but when he looks over the crowd, mouth already open to give the order,
he sees Ashley, and he sees Mr Lee, meets their eyes, and knows he can’t go
back to what he was doing before. Can’t go back to living.
It’s all right. He’s not sure if he wants to or not.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Tony flies himself and a bomb into the portal, and Steve’s heart stops when he
tells Natasha to close the portal. It starts again when he sees the flask of
red and gold, against the backdrop of dark thunderheads, and he’s never been
happier to see someone alive as he did when Tony asked him what happened.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
“We won.”
Without losing anything.
He’s not sure which one is more important.
Chapter End Notes
     So Stan Lee gets an honourary cameo in the movies, so I thought he
     deserved an honourary cameo in fan-fiction too.
***** Interlude II *****
Chapter Summary
     It’s called Movie Night, because Psycho-Analysis Night seemed too
     intimidating and Bruce got flinchy a lot, and Let’s-Share-Life-
     Stories-and-Jokes-and-Alcohol-Because-None-of-us-Will-Ever-Admit-
     That-We-Can’t-Sleep-Without-Nightmares-Anymore-But-We-Occasionally-
     Play-Ludo-and-Cards-and-Watch-Movies Night is too long and has a
     really shitty acronym.
Chapter Notes
     Have some more angst before it gets funny and stupid.
See the end of the chapter for more notes
Post-New-York is an odd time.
Limbo.
They sort of go their separate ways, but all end up in the same place (mostly)
sooner or later. Bruce has nowhere to go, so Tony takes him home, like he is
some pup to shepherd around, and Bruce doesn’t seem to mind.
Natasha and Clint go with S.H.I.E.L.D., both a little downcast and quiet. They
both have been since Phil’s death was called.
Thor never comes back, not for a while, he has things to do in Asgard. Being a
Alien Super Prince has it’s responsibilities, it is assumed.
And Steve goes back to Brooklyn, to his little flat, and potters around,
waiting for the next time he has to suit up, irritable and impatient.
Bored.
They end up in Stark Tower, with nowhere else big enough to keep them all
comfortable and from fighting, it’s only natural that it’s there.
Then it happens again, and again, so they stop fighting it, and make it a
Thing.
It’s called Movie Night, because Psycho-Analysis Night seemed too intimidating
and Bruce got flinchy a lot, and Let’s-Share-Life-Stories-and-Jokes-and-
Alcohol-Because-None-of-us-Will-Ever-Admit-That-We-Can’t-Sleep-Without-
Nightmares-Anymore-But-We-Occasionally-Play-Ludo-and-Cards-and-Watch-Movies
Night is too long and has a really shitty acronym.
Clint’s starting to smile and laugh more as they move on, think of other
things, like Natasha’s recounting of Tony’s refusal to admit that he was dying
of heavy metal poisoning once-upon-a-time, and Bruce’s tales of other worlds,
where Omegas are revered and at the top of the food chain, because no one there
knows that Betas exist, and that female Alphas can bear children. Real, actual
places in the middle of Africa.
So they sit around and laugh and get to know each other until something
changes.
“Sir, there appears to be a security breach.”
“What, no, Jarvis, is this like last time, where there were smelly workmen in
my elevator?” They’ve all turned towards the elevator in question, Nat and
Clint have guns trained at it, and Steve’s holding a knife handle first in
preparation to throw it.
“Because that was disgusting, and unhygienic, and it smelt awful for days.” The
elevator dings. “Who the hell can just walk into one of my elevators without me
knowing until they’re up here any… way…” Tony trails off, and it feels like the
room simultaneously gets about ten degrees hotter and colder at the same time.
“Hello, Mr Stark.”
No one, not even Tony has a word to say. Until-
Clint breaks the line and strides forwards until he’s nose to nose with Phil
Coulson. “You fucker.” He says, spits, in fact. His sides are heaving as if
he’s run a marathon. Natasha’s gun quivers, Steve puts the knife down, and they
all watch.
Clint’s doing a mighty job at keeping his emotions in check, but even as they
watch, they can see him shaking, his fingers clenching around the grip of his
gun, tail rigid and low. Hurt and shock and confusion and fright flit across
his face in equal measures. Quick as a whip, he slaps Phil across the cheek as
hard as he can.
Phil just stands there and takes it, looking too apathetic for anyone’s liking.
“You fucking bastard!” Maybe he meant to scream the words at Phil, but it only
comes out choked and shaky. “You have no— no idea what it’s been like.” Clint’s
whole body is shaking now, full of rage and enmity. “We just sit there, at
night, empty and half alive, and so fucking grateful that we have each other,
and you think it’s okay to just fucking waltz in, just as we’re maybe starting
to get better?”
He turns and nearly runs out of the room, around the corner and out of sight.
The room gets even colder as Natasha glares at Phil before smartly turning away
and following Clint.
No one likes how Phil just stands there, still looking to the right slightly,
eyes cast at the carpet, exactly as Clint had left him. Just stands there and
accepts that maybe he’s lost Clint.
Probably Natasha too.
No one likes to think that maybe Phil’s crying.
Just a little.
Chapter End Notes
     Also I'm really disappointed that none of you have noticed the cameos
     that everyone is getting.
     I'll try to make one a chapter.
***** Chapter 14 *****
Chapter Summary
     Tony wants to touch, just a little, but he’s afraid that if he does,
     then he’ll break this little bubble, this invincible little world
     that has put everything else on hold; all that society crap isn’t
     important whilst they’re sheltered in the tent like this, wrapped in
     secrets and canvas and each other.
     He really shouldn’t be doing this. He swore off Alphas when he was
     fourteen.
Chapter Notes
     asdfghjkl;
     This is where it gets better.
     Funnier.
See the end of the chapter for more notes
Several Months Later
He wasn't sure how he quite ended up in the passenger seat of a land rover, on
the wrong side of the vehicle, might he mention, with two more rowdy Avengers,
Clint in the seat behind the driver-Steve. Well, Natasha is there too, but she
doesn't really count as rowdy.
There is a half full bag of gummy snakes by his hip, jammed between his leg and
the centre console, and a bottle of coke between his knees. The seatbelt sits
on the wrong side of his neck, and it's uncomfortable and weird and he's
freaking out every time they pass another car, because he thinks they're going
to collide.
Clint is singing along with the radio, and at least the same crappy music plays
in Australia, as the good ol' USA, and Steve's pointing out every little odd
thing in sight, and then wondering, out loud, if it's in America or not, dear
soul.
Tony wants to let out a childish sob to indicate his boredom. He's got no
technology—banned by Steve Jerkface Rogers—and therefore nothing to do. He's
already had a three-hour nap.
He drums his fingers on his leg, and looks out the window. Maybe the physics is
different here, and then he actually does the math and sighs, because its not,
and he's still- "Bored!" He says loudly, throwing his arms up.
Natasha pinches him. “Shh, it’s the point.”
“But camping? What’s the point?”
“There is none. It’s a bit of fun. Lighten up, Stark.” Clint pinches him too,
and Tony shrinks into the corner.
“Meanies.” He grumbles. “We could’ve flown out here, you know.” He presses his
nose to the window and looks outside. It's green and hilly and there are a lot
of trees. He doesn’t recognise any of them, and it's Autumn here and they all
still have leaves in various shades of cheery, calm green. He thinks he’s in
the land of the devil.
It’s hot enough.
“Look, over there.” Steve pulls over, and they’re on the side of a mountain
with a good view over the valley. He’s pointing to a small town, sitting on the
banks of a river. If it floods, the village, and the cows and… goats? Really?
Around it will be in a bit of trouble.
“It’s like, three houses.”
“A bit more than that, I think.” Clint says, pulling his sunglasses off.
“There’s a general store, five houses, a toilet block, and a pub. A little
further away there are four separate campsites, and a cave system.”
“Creepy.” Tony mutters.
Clint kicks him. “And flexible.”
Tony reaches back and hits him, and before Clint can retaliate, Steve grabs
both of them, twisting over the centre console to do so. “Children!”
Tony shakes him off quickly and curls back into the corner. “Let’s just go.”
Steve makes sure that Clint isn’t going to do anything, and they set off again.
The campsite they’re using is relatively quiet, next to the river, and bumpy.
They park the cars on the ridge, and walk down the hill, only about five
metres, but two of that is straight down, to the flatter area by the river.
They jostle about and manage to set up three tents, and it’s not supposed to
rain, so they leave their cooking gear outside. Then it’s not supposed to get
dark for several hours, and they’re not hungry. Clint’s already climbed all of
the trees in the immediate area, Bruce found the toilets as they drove in, and
Natasha has determined that there is nothing like bears or deer or wolves and
they’re honestly, quite safe.
“No wolves?” Steve is honestly surprised, going by his tone.
“Not all of us grew up in Canada, blondie.” Tony says dryly. He is writing in
the sandy soil with a stick.
“It’s not that, it’s just in Europe, we had to be really careful when we caught
meat because the offal would attract wolves.”
“There aren’t wolves in Australia at all.” Bruce comments, “The next best thing
were Thylacines, and the last one died out in 1936.”
“I remember reading about that.” Steve adds from where he is sitting on the
grass, trying to get a campfire started. It’s smouldering gently, with the
occasional lick of flame. “It was in the newspapers.”
“You’ve got to be kidding me.” Tony grumbles.
Steve yelps—the fire had caught, and burnt his wrist.
They fry sausages and sheep’s kidneys, and eat it around the fire, and then
stay up and argue, reaching over each other for choc chip cookies they bought
in a town earlier, and jerky strips.
Tony asks Natasha about what’s between her and Clint, and from there it
degenerates into a game of truth or dare.
Steve should’ve gone to bed hours ago.
“Oh, come on Bruce, you’re going to defend him on this one? Seriously?” Tony is
quite whiny when he needs to be, and even when he doesn’t need to be.
“I am.” Bruce has removed his glasses, to stop them fogging up now that it’s
gotten cold, despite the fire. Natasha and Clint are curled up together, Tony’s
leaning against Thor, and Bruce is laying with his feet in Clint’s lap, and his
head in Tony’s. Steve feels a little left out. “If people don’t want to
disclose information about their Bonds, then they have the right to refuse.
“Now, just because it turns out that Phil didn’t die, doesn’t mean that Clint
is compelled to return to him, Bond or no. It’s his life, and if you use that
brain of yours for once, you will remember that Bond-rights have changed.”
“Well screw you too.” Tony pokes Bruce in the cheek, and laughs. Steve ignores
the way that his gut twists, ignores the hollow feeling. This is his team, yes,
but his pack is dead.
“Okay, Steve.” Clint calls over to him, and Steve starts. “Truth or dare?”
“Truth?” He’s not sure what the dare would entail, but he’s certain that he’s
choosing the lesser of two evils. It’s not like he has anything to hide.
“You ever had a mate?”
Okay, maybe he has a little to hide. “Yes.” He says, clipped and short. He
notices Tony is now sitting up a little straighter.
“Ooh, who?”
Steve smiles demurely. “I answered your question.”
“Yeah, but you don’t just answer a question like that without supplying
details.”
“Nah, he answered it.” Wait, Tony was defending him? “Go on Steve, your turn.”
“Umm, alright.” He thinks for a moment. “Clint.”
“Oh, here we go.” Clint groans.
“Truth or dare?” He’s got a good idea for both.
“Dare. Bring it on.”
“Jump in the river.”
“Fuck you very much.”
“I didn’t finish.” Steve tuts. “Jump in the river naked.”
Tony sniggers. “Come on Legolas. Into the river Nimrodel you go.”
“I hate you all.” Clint declares. “Except the Hulk. He lets me brush his hair.”
Clint strips, and walks over to the river. They all abandon the fire and follow
him.
The river’s pretty rocky, and flows rather rapidly, but downstream a little
there is a deeper pool, and Steve doesn’t doubt that it’s freezing.
Clint pokes a toe in carefully and yelps, pulling it back out. His tail’s
clamped to his ass firmly, just as his ears are clamped to his head. Tony looks
at him sternly and points at the water, and Clint lets out a faked sob and
wades out into the river, cursing the whole time.
“I think Steven said jump, Hawkeye, not meander.” Thor booms merrily.
Clint mutters something, and dives in from where he is, knee deep. He surfaces
quickly, and stands, up to his waist now. “Oh shit, I think my balls are
shrinking.”
Tony roars with laughter. Steve gets him a towel. Clint splashes them all with
water when he gets close enough to shake it all over them.
Back in front of the fire now, and all dry, they conclude that going to bed
might be a wise idea.
It’s a given that Natasha and Clint will share a tent, and they vanish quickly,
and the other four are left sitting on the grass awkwardly, trying to figure
out how to make this work.
Tony immediately says that he can sleep with Bruce, and Bruce doesn’t seem to
mind, but then Thor thoughtfully points out that he and Steve won’t fit in one
of the tents together, and suggests that he and Bruce stay in one tent, and
Tony and Steve in the other.
Tony can’t find an argument about that quickly enough, and Steve’s used to
bunking with people he doesn't generally get along with, wait, that’s wrong, he
and Tony get on pretty well most of the time, so maybe he’s used to bunking
with people who don’t really like him too much, and so that’s how it is.
They shuffle into the tent and kick their shoes off one at a time, and Steve
shimmies himself into his sleeping bag, pulling it as tight around himself as
he can. He’s never been good with the cold, once, because his joints would lock
up and ache for hours at the very thought of it, so it’s rather ingrained for
him to seek out warmth, and now because feeling water freezing around your
ankles does something to a man. Tony gets in his just as quickly, but doesn’t
huddle himself up so much. Steve stays where he is, even though he’s facing
Tony—he’s getting warm now, so it’s pointless moving—and closes his eyes.
He gets hot at some point and unzips the sleeping bag so he’s got a little room
to move and goes back to sleep.
Something brushes against his waist heavily, and he jerks awake. He can’t just
camp without being on constant alert, a habit that has saved his life a few
times, so any touch or abnormal noise is more than enough to get him up, but
it’s just Tony, who probably rolled over because he was so cold—sleeping bag’s
kicked down—and Steve caves to the urge to touch and pulls his limp body
closer, tucks him up into a comfortable position under the blanket with him. He
won’t admit it, but the bit he misses most is the liberty to do what he wanted
whilst in Europe, more than that, he misses knowing that they’re safe,
ensconced amongst the trees, out of sight, out of mind. It was there that
people didn’t care what happened, didn’t care that he was mated to Bucky,
didn’t care that his pack was breaking every social norm at least once a week,
as long as they got the job done, that was enough, and they could shut up about
what happened between, thank you very much. He does his best not to compare the
feel of Tony’s lax body to Bucky’s. There’s a myriad of differences, so many he
doesn’t even know where to start, or which one is the biggest. Probably scent.
He buries his nose behind one of Tony’s ears, and goes back to sleep.
They haven’t moved an inch when Steve wakes up, and one of his hands are
slightly numb, because Tony’s head has been on his upper arm, but he doesn’t
mind too much. He listens for a moment to see if he can hear any of the others
up, but the tent is still dark, so it’s probably just dawn. The way his body
seems to just know what time it is never ceases to amaze him.
He wills himself to sleep in for a change.
It’s not too hard.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
“Dude, what the hell?” Tony pushes Steve as hard as he can, given his position.
He’s been awake for some time, being rather selfish and revelling in the
feeling of someone touching him just because they could and they cared about
him—he wasn’t stupid. He knew that he kicked the sheets around in his sleep,
and the consequently rolled over, probably onto Steve, knowing his luck, thus
waking Steve up.
And Steve had taken pity on him, instead of just waking him so he could get
back in his own sleeping bag.
He approved of his sleeping-self’s tactics.
But he kind of needs to piss now, and it’s well and truly light.
Steve wakes in increments; he lets out a breath of air and stirs slightly, his
arms tighten for a moment and he smiles. And oh God, he’s beautiful. The light
filtering through the tent has a greenish tint, lending the ruffled strands of
Steve’s hair a lime tinge, disregarding the dark blotches where dew has settled
on the outside and is reflecting the light before it gets to them. His
eyelashes have a muted curve, and the apex rests on the skin beneath the
socket. His lips are still slightly parted, florid, and Tony wants to touch,
just a little, but he’s afraid that if he does, then he’ll break this little
bubble, this invincible little world that has put everything else on hold; all
that society crap isn’t important whilst they’re sheltered in the tent like
this, wrapped in secrets and canvas and each other.
He really shouldn’t be doing this. He swore off Alphas when he was fourteen.
“Morning.” Steve mumbles. He still hasn’t let go.
The hand that isn’t under Tony’s head moves from where it is holding him down
from the sheer weight over his waist, and comes up to scratch his hair softly.
He’d be lying if he said he didn’t like it. But he really has to get up before
something happens that they’ll both regret, so he pushes Steve again, but that
has no real effect. Steve smooths his hair and shushes him.
“Steve, let go.”
Steve just pulls him closer, a big ball of warmth and hard muscle which looks
nice but isn’t as comfortable as the softer curves of an Omega, and Tony’s nose
is pressed to Steve’s chest, and he bites his lip. Steve smells good.
Better than good, actually.
“Sleep, Buck.” Steve insists.
Tony is nonplussed. Did Steve just… Does Steve think he’s Bucky? Oh yes, Tony’s
read the files, how Bucky was Steve’s school friend, and then part of the
Howling Commandoes.
What had happened between them?
“Oi!” He pokes Steve. This does nothing, so he opens his mouth and sinks his
teeth into the hard line of Steve’s jaw.
That wakes him up.
His eyes snap open, lashes jumping a quarter of an inch to make way for vibrant
colour, and air whistles in through his nose.
Neither of them move, and it’s the perfect impasse, neither really wants to
move, but it’s probably best they do, and it’s stifling, Tony’s got the taste
of Steve’s skin on his tongue, and Steve’s got the weight of Tony’s body in his
arms, and Tony wants to smother himself and maybe then he’ll wake up from this
stupid dream because let’s face it, he wouldn’t go camping if his life depended
on it. He wouldn’t sleep in a tent with Rogers if it were below zero outside.
Would he?
Well he’s here now. It’s probably all some figment of his subconsciousness; a
well-repressed part of his subconsciousness that should make him want to spend
more time than necessary with every Alpha he meets.
Well fuck it.
“Let me go.” He growls. Steve’s hands spring away from him, as they would if
Tony were on fire, or covered with acid, or better yet, as though he is a
snake. The moment he can, he kicks the sleeping bag off and crawls out of the
tent in a manner he thinks is angry, but probably isn’t.
He ignores the catcalls from Clint. He’s not doing a walk of shame. Ducks
behind a large tree to empty his bladder, he isn’t walking eighty yards just to
use a toilet, and when he comes back, Steve’s up too, looking less than awake,
four angry marks bracketing his stupidly perfect jaw, and oh God his hair.
He can’t help the snigger. Steve’s hair is a mess, like full on bed-head mess,
hair sticking out everywhere, in all directions, kind of bed-head. It makes his
head look too big, and that’s a problem that Tony should have, not Steve.
“Alright, you caught me. It’s true. My secret is that I have really bad morning
hair.” Steve says. He seems resigned to the fact that his hair resembles a
bird’s nest. He pushes a hand through it, and it does nothing to affect the
appearance of his hair, and one half is still total flat; a cowlick that spans
the entire side of his head. He just walks to the river, kneels on a large
rock, and dunks his entire head into the water, and draws it out, sopping wet.
He shakes it damp and fixes it, and it falls into its usual place.
Tony walks over to where Bruce is heating milk and water on a portable gas
stove. He is offered coffee, and he accepts, even though it probably tastes
awful. The instant kind always does.
“Do you want a little something for that?” Clint and Natasha have revived the
fire, and are heating a frying pan over it, with a plate of bacon and eggs
prepared to fry. Clint motions to the bite mark on Steve’s jaw, and Steve stops
picking water out of his ears to rubs it self-consciously.
“It’ll be gone in an hour or two. I’ll be right.”
Natasha’s eyeing him with a mixture of curiosity, and what seems like blatant
displeasure. Steve feels the need to defend himself.
“I don’t wake up quickly enough, apparently.” He says.
Natasha and Clint exchange a Look, and Clint throws a handful of bacon into the
pan.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Clint throws rocks at them from the other side of the creek and Tony throws
some back before he realises that he can’t hit Clint from this distance, and so
goes to wade across the river. He’s about to put his foot in it when Clint
sings out; “The water is lava!”
Tony overbalances, and fixes his step so he ends up awkwardly stuck, one foot
on the bank, another on a rock, several feet away. He flaps his hands about,
and glares at Clint.
The next rock Clint throws bounces off Bruce’s knee. Bruce shudders and growls,
and they all make for the river, skipping from rock to rock in accordance of
Clint’s rules, and end up huddled on the other bank. Tony gives a dramatic
squawk when Natasha leap-frogs over his head and pushes him into the water. She
ends up on the opposite bank entirely dry. They stop next to Clint, Tony last,
dragging himself out of the water angrily.
When they look back, Bruce is doubled over from laughter, rocking back and
forth on his back on the grass.
“Bruce you suck!” Tony shouts. Someone pushes Clint into the river. He grabs
Thor and they both topple in.
“Such a triviality as lava shall not make the son of Odin beg for mercy!” Thor
cries as he sinks.
Clint flounders and gasps for air. “It’s cold!” He howls.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
They sit around the fire again that night, and one by one retire, Steve nudges
another log on, and sparks skitter up into the nether, little fireflies of
ember and ash, and Steve and Tony watch them fly. It’s just the two of them
left; everyone else has escaped the creeping coldness and gone to bed. Steve is
just staring up at the moon, knees crooked up under his chin, toes and fingers
pointed towards the fire, and Tony’s staring at the fire with the same
intensity, but his posture is far more relaxed.
“I hope no one’s tried vandalising the tower.” Tony says suddenly. “Wait, maybe
I do.”
“What?” It isn’t hard to tear his eyes away from the moon and look at Tony
instead.
“I hope someone’s vandalised the tower.”
“Why?”
“Well, normally, I’m a really good deterrent, but people have to realise that
I’m not there, and I just want to see the look on their face when they try.”
“What’ll happen to them?”
“Hmm, let’s say they’ll be getting a crash course on handling a contact
deprived Dumm-E.” Steve blinks. He’s met Dumm-E, at the time the bot had been
in time-out, and wearing a party had that declared that the robot was ‘IDIOT’.
It was a nice creature, if a little friendly. “Oh.”
“It also means that I won’t have to calm Dumm-E down when I get back.”
“I’ll do it.” It was Tony’s turn to blurt out ‘what?’ “I’ll talk to Dumm-E.”
“He’ll flatten you.” Tony warns. Steve raises and eyebrow and stretches out. He
knows that the firelight throws his muscles into relief. “Oh fine.” Tony caves.
“I won’t say ‘I told you so’.”
“Yes you will.” Steve says with a smile. He settles back in the grass, feeling
more content and full than he can remember being for a long time.
It’s the same for the next few days.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
He might argue against it, but he really didn’t mind sharing a tent with Steve,
by the time they were on the plane back to America, he didn’t have to worry
about his natural scent, because being in such close quarters with Steve for so
long had masked his own entirely.
It was quite a nice scent.
He falls asleep on Steve’s shoulder in the airport at LA whilst they are
waiting for their connecting flight, and Clint takes a photo and posts it on
Twitter. He spends the next twenty minutes in the next terminal over telling
Pepper that no, nothing happened and never will, God, can’t you just realise
that planes are a shitty place to sleep and just calm down, woman! Tell the
press or whoever’s asking, oh, Fury?, tell him to shove his eye-patch up—
She cut him off then, in the way that only she can, and tells him that she’ll
deal with it, and to check Twitter for himself. Apparently #TonyandCap is
trending.
A lot.
Clint is howling with laughter when Tony returns. Even Natasha seems less
standoffish than usual.
Apparently it’s not the only picture he’s posted, so it’s been trending for a
few days. Tony thinks he might die from a combination of shame and guilt.
At least he will never have to explain it to Steve. He’s not quite prepared to
have the ‘shipping’ talk with him.
He think Steve catches wind at the next press conference when some nosy
reporter starts asking questions about their pack dynamic. Awkward, personal
questions.
He watches as Steve stiffens minutely, more visible in the line of his tail
than anywhere else, before he smiles broadly and fields the question easily.
Tony still remembers the words, and not because he’s rewatched the footage
about three times, but because the answer was oddly impersonal for such an
intimate question.
‘Our pack is very unique, and it’ll surely take us longer than a few months to
really sort things out when we have such an unusual dynamic.’
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Tony still isn’t sure how he didn’t say that Steve was their Alpha, even with
Thor around.
Chapter End Notes
     (Post IM3, I’m saying screw canon on this one. IM3 is stupid. Why
     would Tony get rid of the arc reactor? It’s a part of him, as in
     bolted to his entire chest. It would take major surgery to remove,
     and the recovery for it is somewhere between six months and two
     years. He wouldn’t be able to not be Iron Man for that long. And he
     blew the suits up. I am not accepting that. It was a good movie, but
     I disagree with hmm, 20% of the plot. Like the part where they set it
     up perfectly for Pepper to dump Tony and to get with Happy BUT THEY
     DIDN’T (because that’s totally cannon and I do ship Pepperony, but I
     ship Pepper/Happy so much more.))
     So, they’re camping near a small town that’s about two hours drive
     from Canberra, called Wee Jasper. It’s pretty neat. I camped there
     with my family a month or two ago.
     There is more angst, but nothing really upsetting for a few chapters.
     Okay, nothing really upsetting for about two chapters. Even then,
     it's mostly UST.
     And the plot's going to blindside you all.
     Like.
     Big time.
***** MY DEEPEST APOLOGIES *****
Chapter Summary
     1. i am never going to fix the HTML on this
     2. I AM DISCONTINUING THIS IM SO SORRY
     3. this is everything i have written in the rest of this document and
     i really am never going to finish this fic, if any of you would like
     to go ahead, but as youve probably noticed ive moved on to different
     pastures and tbh i can write way better now also this was mostly just
     self indulgent BS
     4. ??? hope you all enjoy and i have honestly forgotton whats in here
     but there's notes galore im p sure and half finished chapters and
     huge jumps in information
     5. end game was supposed to be steve/tony/bucky FYI
Chapter 13;
Steve finds his routine easier to keep at the tower, contrary to what he
thought when he first arrived. He gets up, runs places, up and down the
emergency escape stairs if he absolutely has to, but usually outside in the
cool morning air, eats, showers and brushes his teeth, and then immerses
himself in things.
Like umm…
Things.
Like.
You know, things.
Okay, so he does nothing. But what does he really have to do? He hasn’t been
able to put a pencil to paper without feeling sick since the train in
Switzerland, he can only exercise for so long before even he has to admit that
it’s too much, and things just seem… boring. Nothing can hold his attention for
more than a few hours anymore. But the hours still slip away alarmingly fast,
and he knows that he has to do something or he doesn’t really know what’s going
to happen.
But choosing what to do isn’t easy when there are literally a million different
things to do that he hasn’t tried before, and nothing seems interesting after
an hour or two.
He supposes that moving into the tower probably helped with that front. Just a
little.
“Sir, Master Stark would like to see you.”
Steve bites his tongue and doesn't tell Jarvis not to call him ‘sir’. Jarvis
delights in not doing exactly what people ask.
“Let him in, then.” Steve pushes himself up so he’s sitting on his bed, and
then gets up proper, so it at least looks like he’s been doing more than laying
in bed since he showered.
For a few days after coming back from their break in Australia, which they were
actually apparently very lucky to get, so soon after New York; apparently
S.H.I.E.L.D. was still fielding enquiries from various media outlets, and Steve
was yet to see a magazine that didn’t have at least one of the Avengers on the
cover. Okay, so magazines about gardening aside.
It was still weird to see his own face, admittedly under the cowl, as Fury was
not having another Avenger outed. Bruce, Tony and Thor were enough as it was,
and all three of them could safely guarantee their privacy whilst out and about
through their own means, but Clint and Natasha were as likely to break fingers
as they were to ask people to politely go away, and Steve would have no hope.
He, as Hill kindly put it, is too damned polite.
Since returning from Australia, he, for a couple of days, had felt almost
normal again, but the feeling hadn’t been permanent, and he had slowly slipped
back down.
“He is presently unable to. He wishes you to join him in the sitting room.”
Steve rubs his eyes. He feels tired. “Okay.”
Tony’s sitting on the rug with his back to Steve, preoccupied with something in
front of him. The whole room smells foreign, like a stranger has rubbed
themselves against everything possible in the room. Steve bristles a little.
“Steve, is that you?” Tony twists to see behind him, and beams. “Come here.
I’ve got something for you. No, down, sit, mutt.”
“What have you-”
“Come here! Sit down. Jarvis says you’ve been a little off lately, so I got you
something to fix it.”
Steve slowly approaches Tony, and sits where he indicated.
“Surprise!” Tony holds up nothing less than a puppy, which he nearly drops when
it squirms particularly enthusiastically. Steve automatically reaches out to
catch it. Tony lets it go, and Steve’s the one holding the puppy now.
“What is that?”
“It’s a dog, obviously.”
“No, I mean why do you have a puppy?”
“You’ve been moping.” Tony grins at him. “And it’s been proven that social
contact helps with PTSD and bond-loss, and basically, this is the ‘sorry-we’re-
a-shitty-pack’ gift.”
“Post-Traumatic— I don’t have-!”
“You’re not denying bond loss!” Tony sings.
Steve hugs the puppy to his chest and frowns. “But I’m not confirming it,
either.” Steve pauses and lets the puppy lick his hand.
“You’re moping. Like, serious, level 8 moping. You don’t get that unless you
lose someone. You lost someone. Someone important, and you’re still blaming
yourself, aren’t you?”
“I don’t need to explain myself to you, Tony.” Steve goes to push himself to
his feet, but Tony grabs his ankle, and he has to sit back down, else hurt the
puppy.
“It’s Bucky, isn’t it?”
Steve drops the puppy, and it bolts across the room in search of something or
another.
“Holy shit, I’m right.” Tony skitters back until he’s pressed against the
couch. His expression is indecipherable. “That was… how did you get away with
it?” he sounds slightly awed. “Wasn't he a Beta?”
“He was, until he was caught by Schmidt, and used as a lab rat. Then… I’m not
sure what he was. We were camping. In the middle of nowhere. No one was there
to care about us, as long as we took down the Schmidt.”
“But it didn’t start after you got him back, did it?” Well, if Steve ever
needed any proof that Tony wasn’t totally oblivious, there it was. “It went on
before, right?”
“Careful Tony, your genius is shining through.”
“Yeah, yeah, whatever. Just spill.”
“Did I ever tell you what it was like before the war?”
Tony just scowls. It’s amusing to know that he just expected the necessities,
not a history lesson.
“Well, for starters, there wasn’t all this Omega liberation. Not even a bit.
There were no tests for secondary gender; you had to wait. It was violent and
dangerous, especially if you couldn’t keep your mouth shut.
“When I was a kid, my dad was physically abusive and a drunk and, hey, we can
relate. Except he thought I was an Omega because I was so small. At least you
had your bloods protecting you. Well, he died, then mom died, and I went to
live with my nan. Bucky was there through all of it. I was two years older than
him, and he phased when he was thirteen. He freaked right out, and he was only
a Beta. He didn’t have to worry about heat and pheromones and whatever. I
waited and waited, and watched everyone around me phase, and I honestly thought
I’d never mature. Until I did. You know my medical history. My asthma. When I
went to college, it was the worst. If there was an Omega anywhere near heat,
which was pretty much always, I couldn’t be there, but it wasn't bad enough
that I couldn’t breathe. No, my body had to go into overdrive like any other
Alpha’s.” Steve’s not even sure why he’s telling Tony. Perhaps he’ll understand
somehow. “Bucky always just helped me. We didn’t mate, not until… after, but it
was nice all the same.” Steve pauses and smirks. “And God the mouth on that
kid.”
Tony’s eyes widen and his jaw drops. “Did you just…”
“You sound so surprised.” The puppy finally returns, and Steve picks it up
again and deposits it between his legs. It tries to scrabble over his thigh,
but can’t quite seem to reach. “I can go on, especially if you keep making that
face.”
Tony stops making that face, but he does flop down and puts his head on Steve’s
thigh and gestures for Steve to continue. “Never had I dreamed that you’d have
a dirty mouth.”
Steve hesitates a moment too long, thinking about what he should say—as it is,
he’s surprised he came out with the bit before—and Tony pinches him.
“Sorry! I didn’t actually mean to say that before!”
“But you offered to go on.”
“Do you really want to hear about my sexual exploits with another Omega that
much?”
“Are you suggesting that I’m an Omega?”
Steve backtracks and realises what he had said. “No! Unless you are, which
would be completely ok. I never told you about Peggy? She was the best. She-”
“Okay old man. You can stop reminiscing.”
They fall silent.
“Do you ever regret anything?”
“I regret coming out here when Jarvis asked me to.” He’s lying, Tony turns his
face away; he knows Steve’s lying, which is good.
“Steve I’m trying to be serious.”
“I know. I just.” This just turned towards things that Steve doesn’t want to
think about, let alone talk about.
“My dad, he always used to say; don’t regret anything, Anthony, until it’s too
late.” Tony props himself up so he can shift closer.
Steve rolls his eyes and scratches the puppy. “He told me the same. But when
it’s too late, you regret everything.”
“Do you regret Project Rebirth?” Tony sounds shocked, and rightly so.
“No, no. Not at all. But nearly everything else, yes. I got Bucky pregnant, you
know. God that was stupid.”
“You’ve got a kid? Not even I managed that, and I had a lot of sex when I was
younger.”
“He died before-” Steve doesn't think he can talk anymore. He shouldn’t have
spoken about this. Just because for a fleeting moment he thought he’d be okay,
doesn’t mean that he was. He wishes, not for the first time, that he could see
the forties with the same level of detachment as everyone else. Even for Thor,
it was a long time ago, and he can recall things between then and now, but for
Steve it was literally last year, and he hadn’t quite gotten the hang of
compartmentalising his memory.
Tony, in a very uncharacteristic gesture, wordlessly puts his arms around
Steve’s waist and rubs his head against his stomach.
“You know what would be the worst?” Tony’s voice is muffled, probably because
his face is buried somewhere between Steve’s navel and the puppy. “If he was
still alive and holy shit Natasha don’t do that.”
“Stark, I didn’t realise that you swung that way.”
Tony scrambles away from Steve, and he misses the heat and weight already. “I
don’t! I’m providing much needed emotional support for Steve!”
“I know, I didn’t know you did stuff like that. I’ve always known you tend to
go for attractive guys you can browbeat into submission.” She shrugs. “Anyway,
Clint wants to watch a movie, and apparently the sound in here’s the best and
he’s too scared to come and kick you two out.”
“Finally, someone on this team who respects their superiors.”
“I respect Fury.” Steve said plainly.
“But he’s not your superior.”
“Just bring Clint in here and I’ll find somewhere for this little guy to
sleep.” Steve stands and scoops the puppy up with one hand. “Call Thor and
Bruce and we’ll make a night of it!” he adds as he walks down the
corridor.Chapter 14;
The Avengers grow, picking up lab accidents and mutants, and no one dies.
It’s a win on all fronts.
Steve noticed that there was something wrong the moment he stepped into the
lobby of Stark Tower. It just smelt wrong, off, but the Omega-lady behind the
counter didn’t seem to notice. He walked over to her and held up his ID card,
and she waved him on.
The closer he got to the elevator, the stronger the scent was, thick and sweet,
not over bearing, but it went straight to his groin, and soon the desire to
find the source of this smell got so strong to the point where he knew that he
would have a tough time controlling his instincts if he went into that little
metal box, and instead turned sharply left, and opted to take the stairs.
All eighty-eight floors.
S.H.I.E.L.D. had better pay him a little overtime for this. He was only
supposed to be picking up Clint’s new bow and the unique polymer sample that
Tony had developed for uniforms.
For a fleeting second when he pushed open the fire escape door on the eighty-
eighth floor, he thought that he was going to bear witness to the return of his
asthma. It was a nice reminder that he was just human, but it was a horrible
reminder that he was just an Alpha, too.
He gripped the doorframe tightly, and sucked air in through his teeth, and
thought about more sobering things, like dead people he knew.
He made his way further into the floor, picking his way through the myriad of
machinery. “Tony?” He stopped by the glass airlock door that lead to the main
section of the lab. No one could get in there except for Tony, Pepper and
Bruce. And select others when Jarvis was feeling that Tony really needed
someone (Steve) to tell him to get to bed.
He banged his fist on the glass when Tony didn’t answer.
Sometimes the genius got so lost in his work that something like that was the
only way to get his attention. “Tony!”
“Hey Cap.” Tony’s voice came over the intercom. Odd. Usually he just opened the
door and let Steve in.
“Hey, Tony. Is everything alright?”
“Just fine. I’ll get Butterfingers to bring you the equipment.” Tony sounded
slightly strained.
“Wouldn’t it be easier for me to get it myself?”
There was a long pause, cut by Tony making those odd little sounds that he does
when he’s arguing with himself over something important, like a motherboard or
soldering the wiring for his armour. “Oh, fine. Just don’t touch anything. I’m
running calibrations.” The door hissed as it slid open, and Steve leant on the
frame when the pheromones assaulted his nose.
“Wow.”
He followed Tony’s advice and weaved through the lab, taking great care to
skirt around everything in the room. He found Tony in the suit, reading a
holographic display that was changing so quickly that Steve could hardly read
what was displayed on it.
“Why are you in the suit?”
“Running calibrations.” He reached out and slid some of the holograms around,
pulling bars and twisting imaginary dials.
“Are you going to tell me what for, or is the smell supposed to be a hint?”
“Smell?” Tony seemed genuinely puzzled, but with the vocal filter on the
helmet, Steve could be mistaken. “Huh. Must be working. I’m calibrating the air
filters in this thing. That last mission was nasty. You know, if I have to go
into the sewers again, I would like not to gag to death.” Tony turned back to
his display. “Stuff’s on the bench over there.”
Steve found the bench and the equipment, and gathered it all up. It was all a
lot lighter than it looked. It was about then that something started to niggle
in his gut asides from lust. Something wasn’t quite right. Call it a gut
feeling. Either that, or he was getting used enough to the smell to be able to
think past it. But he was a little curious now. Tony was acting weird. “Is
everything alright with you?” Steve settled against the bench, prepared for the
rather drawn out process of prying information from Tony.
Tony felt his ears flatten a little more under his helmet. He was perfectly
fine, apart from the part where he was drunk, and actually sort of really
wanted Steve to fuck him into a wall or on one of his benches, his dignity be
damned, whilst at the same time he didn’t because it was really nice having
Steve treat him as an equal, and he didn’t even want to think about how Steve
and his seventy year old sensibilities would treat him if the Alpha found out
he was an Omega. That, and the thought of mating with anyone, even the Virtuous
Captain Rogers, disgusted (and terrified) him.
“Tony?”
“I’m fine, cap. Just busy. Can you go away please?”
Steve came into his line of vision, and stood there, hands on his hips, the
very vision of stubborn. “Take the helmet off and I’ll believe it.”
“That would defeat the purpose of calibrating my air filters.” He paused. He
needed something to make his lie slightly more effective. “What does it smell
like?” Well, of course he knew, it was his body that was secreting the smell.
Steve made a pained face. “Sweet. Umm…” He was making a conscious effort to
breathe through his mouth. He closed his eyes, and took a deep breath through
his nose. And full out moaned. Tony bit his tongue when he gasped
involuntarily, and tasted blood.
Steve’s knees wobbled a little, he slipped, and his knees hit the floor. Tony’s
heart leapt into his throat, stammering in its offbeat pattern. Steve surely
couldn’t be that affected by his scent that he had become like this, that he
would be this… weak? No, Steve isn’t weak, Tony cancelled the thought out.
Steve’s got the serum running through his blood, it’s definitely made his
senses stronger, and it’s probably bought out more of his animalistic
instincts, making him more susceptible to pheromones. He licked his lips, and
tried to ignore the wetness that was slowly staining his inner thighs.
“Rogers?” He asked, glad for once that the armour’s vocal output had only one
tone of voice.
Steve’s head snapped up to look at him, his pupils blown wide in lust. “Jesus,
Tony, it smells so good, better than any other Omega I’ve smelt.” Tony
deactivated the audio input in the helmet before he could hear anything else
Steve had to say about how good Tony smelt. He didn’t need to head Steve’s
constant, deep rumble, and he held himself in place, stock still, ignoring the
HUD in the suit, how it was displaying his vitals, all peaking in dangerous
levels.
Steve took a surprisingly small amount of time to compose himself, but didn’t
stand. He just reigned himself in, and Tony reactivated the external audio feed
to hear what the Alpha was saying.
“I will leave when I can ascertain that you are at least, appearing healthy.
Please remove the helmet.”
Tony couldn’t stop himself if he wanted to, and he reached up and pulled the
helmet off with a series of soft clicks. Surprisingly, Jarvis didn’t even try
to lecture him or give him any warnings, and the moment the air seal on the
suit was broken, and the smells of the outside world seeped in, Tony probably
would’ve jumped Steve were it not for the armour. “Jesus fuck.” Tony gasped.
Steve probably couldn’t smell it, but his Alpha scent had filled the room as
much as Tony’s heat had, and damnit Tony would be using this as masturbation
material for weeks to come. Hah. To come.
Because he was stupid, he approached Steve to prove his point. He crouched in
front of the super soldier, and looked into his eyes. Steve’s ears twitched.
“See?” He asked, “Perfectly fine.”
Tony didn’t see, however, what Steve did next, but it wound up with their
mouths mashed together, Steve’s fingers dragging through his hair and rubbing
the tattered remains of his ears in all the right places. He vaguely realised
that he was lying on his back, and Steve was kneeling between his knees, oh God
kissing him.
Oh God his mind had been reverted to that of a horny teenager.
The kiss was rather inelegantly executed, but Tony’s body really didn’t care
all that much. It still tried to arc up to meet Steve’s lazy thrusts, simple
(powerful) rolls of the soldier’s hips, and his legs still fell apart until the
suit’s joints reached their capacity.
Fuck. He was willingly submitting to Steve.
Steve seemed to realise that, and pushed his tongue forwards, and Tony let him,
his jaw falling slack in favour of more of what Steve would offer.
It wasn’t until Steve accidentally bit his lip in his enthusiasm, sharp teeth
easily sinking through Tony’s skin, that Tony snapped to his senses and jerked
away. Steve too, pulled away, but remained between Tony’s legs, pupils blown
and lips slack and reddened. He had done that to Steve.
Steve, the epitome of self-restraint and umm… and not having sex. Tony wasn’t
thinking at his peak. Steve was still between his legs, and he looked really
fuckable and a little like he doesn’t know what to do.
Colour rose in his cheeks. “Gosh, Tony, I’m so sorry. That was out of line,
rude, totally inappropriate.” Tony just lay there and thought about all of the
totally inappropriate things he wanted to do with Steve—to Steve, and tongued
his lip. He had half a mind to squirm away, protect himself, and the other half
telling him to grab Steve by the collar, rut against him, and mess him up even
more. So he just sat there, rooted to the spot, and watched as Steve got to his
feet, the blush extending down to his hip at least, where his shirt had ridden
up against the knee of the Iron Man suit.
Steve grabbed the bow and the polymer sample, and left abruptly, nearly
knocking a beaker stand over on his way past.
Tony waved a holographic screen over and fiddled with the controls. He bought
up the security feed, and found Steve, taking the stairs. He wasn’t being
creepy. He was just making sure that the blond didn’t jump one of his poor,
unsuspecting employees on his way out of the tower.
He got to his feet, bringing the screen with him. He stood in the only clear
patch in the lab, and the robotic arms pieced the suit apart, releasing him
from the titanium-gold alloy. He immediately stripped his undershirt off too,
keeping an eye on the screen, and had to lean on the bench when he saw that
during his lapse of attention, Steve had sat down in the stairwell, knees
slightly spread, head in his hands.
Tony couldn’t see what was happening very clearly, so he selected a different
camera to watch from. The image flickered, and Tony was given a better view. He
probably would’ve dropped something if he were holding it.
Had anyone asked him about the sex drive of Captain America, he would’ve
scoffed and said that it didn’t exist. Not that he had been keeping tabs on it.
Not at all.
But Steve definitely had his hand wrapped around his cock, and the palm of his
other hand pressed in his mouth, biting down hard enough for a trickle of blood
to be dribbling down the Not-So-Virtuous Captain’s wrist.
“Jarvis, activate audio.” It must have been Tony’s birthday or something,
because that was the second time in an hour that Jarvis didn’t inform him of
how stupid that command was, and instead did as he was told, and Tony could
hear the faint groans that were escaping Steve’s makeshift gag.
Tony sank into a chair and let his legs fall apart slightly. He pushed his hand
down his pants, and matched Steve stroke for stroke. The pace that Steve set
was too slow for Tony, but he still stuck to it, twisting his hands on the
upstroke to swipe his thumb across the head on the way past. He wet his lips
quickly, and swallowed thickly.
His orgasm took him completely by surprise, shortly after Steve’s, and he
meekly noticed that his boy had been prepared to come since he pretty much sat
down, but he had been so focused on, so in tune with Steve that it hadn’t until
Steve had finished.
Steve had been a lot neater, Tony found. Steve had known exactly when he would
finish, and deftly caught it all in his hand, and Tony thought that he couldn’t
breathe for a second when Steve licked the white fluid off his palm with a
single swipe of his tongue.
Oh fuck. How was he supposed to even look at Steve again?
Steve tried to appear normal and calm when he made it down to the lobby. He
really did, but he was aware of the flush around his cheeks and rising up the
back of his neck, and tried to pretend that they didn’t exist. His hand had
almost healed already, just four little circular scabs now, and they itched
like mad, but he refrained, and clutched Clint’s bow really tightly instead. He
slid the bow and the fabric into the saddlebags of his bike, and swung his leg
over the seat. He jammed his helmet on for a change, all too aware of what he
had just done.
He had just kissed another Alpha, and then jerked off to the memory of Tony’s
rough stubble against his jaw.
He was never going to be able to look Tony in the eye again.
Unfortunately, he had to. Or he at least would have to look Iron Man in the eye
again. He could probably do that.
He made a quick stop at the nearest S.H.I.E.L.D. office, and handed over the
equipment from Tony, and as he was leaving, something struck Steve as odd.
Tony had said that he had been running calibrations on the air filters in the
suit, and he was using Omega pheromones as the scent? It was extremely
difficult and expensive to acquire pheromones in such a large quantity that he
would even be able to scent it from the lobby. In fact it would probably take
about half a gallon of pure pheromones just spilt over every available surface
in Tony’s lab…
Or an Omega in heat.
And Steve hadn’t seen any bottles labelled ‘pheromones’ just lying around.
Which mean that there had been an Omega in heat in Tony’s lab recently.
And he was certain that he had heard somewhere, perhaps from Tony himself, that
Tony didn’t do Omegas in heat. Which really, left one option. And Steve wasn’t
quite sure what to make of it, so he discarded the notion entirely.
Tony was an Omega.
 
“Hey, yeah, can I skip the whole assembling thing today?”
Steve resisted the urge to demand that Tony just show up. “Tony,” Steve sighed
and pinched the bridge of his nose, and started again. “Tony, can you just suit
up please? It’s team training for a reason.”
Tony made an angry sound. “Sorry, let me rephrase that for you. I’m not coming
today.”
Steve gave up being polite. “Tony, I expect you there in fifteen minutes.”
Steve left no room for negotiation in his voice, and Tony whined on the other
end of the line. He just hung up and tried not to think about how submissive
that sound had been. It just solidified the concept that Tony was an Omega even
more.
But the question was, should he confront Tony about it? Something like this
could very easily ruin the team dynamic, and it was just starting to go so
well. Especially if it ever came to a head. Especially if he asked, and he was
wrong.
All of the Avengers now had their own quarters in Stark Mansion, (aptly
redubbed Avenger’s Mansion, because Tony had some thing with the mansion that
no one really wanted to delve into much, also the tower was deemed too much of
a target and Steve wholeheartedly agrees), but most of them preferred to keep
to themselves. Bruce was on what Tony called a ‘pilgrimage’, Steve just said he
was on a working vacation. Natasha and Clint were still S.H.I.E.L.D. assets, so
they spent most of their time abroad, and the rest of the time sleeping on each
other wherever they happened to crash. They were a part of their own pack,
which extended to include other Avengers when necessary.
Thor alternated between Asgard and Jane, and then the occasional, (planned)
team training sessions on a fortnightly basis.
As for Steve. Well. Where to begin?
Tony hadn’t actually offered Steve a room personally like he had the other
Avengers. He just received the blanket offer from Jarvis shortly after Loki had
been returned to Asgard for his punishment. So Steve occasionally spent the
night in the mansion, but more often than not, he was in his apartment in
Brooklyn, waiting for something to go wrong.
Just… waiting.
Tony got to their training site shortly after everyone else did, and demanded
that they just ‘get a wriggle on’ because he had ‘a nice dame—your words,
Rogers—waiting for me back at the mansion.’
Steve had grit out a sharp ‘yes’, and barked out a few orders to them. He still
struggled to think of the Avengers as his pack. They were never around at the
same time, and they were never as close to each other, they lacked the trust
that his Howling Commandos had fought long and hard for.
~~[[---]]~~
Once the final effects of his heat wore off, Tony had a shower. And another
drink. He wished, not for the first time, that the palladium poisoning hadn’t
affected his body quite so much, thank you. Then, he would be able to take
suppressants. It was nice being permanently sterile, but did he still have to
endure heats? He would have to do something about it. He had managed it before.
 
Steve listened to Agent Hill intently. He knew that Tony would definitely tease
him later, he always did, but he didn’t care that much. Debrief was important,
otherwise they wouldn’t have to sit through it.
He tapped the end of his pencil against his wrist gently, writing the
occasional note when he needed to. Around him, the others weren’t behaving
quite so well.
Natasha was listening, of course, she was the only other one who consistently
did so, but Clint’s head was in her lap, cheek rubbing against her groin,
Clint’s feet were in Bruce’s lap. Bruce was vaguely listening to Hill, but he
was rubbing his thumb in little circular motions over Clint’s anklebone. Clint
was humming happily, and there was a low rumble in Bruce’s chest, rather
possessive, and Steve knew that it was the remnants of the Hulk’s Alpha
control; he could smell it. Bruce was likely to be indisposed for the next
eighteen hours or so.
Thor was looking rather dazed, like he’s thinking about something else, and he
likely was. Steve couldn’t get a grip on what Thor was thinking half the time
due to said Asgardian’s lack of ears and tail.
Janet was flicking her stings around her fingers, short sharp flashes of golden
light that Steve didn’t want to be on the receiving end of.
Tony was tapping at his phone avidly, and Steve couldn’t make heads or tails of
the lines of text running across the screen at lightning quick speeds.
He looked back at Hill and refocused himself by closing his eyes and taking a
deep breath through his nose.
It didn’t quite work like it usually did.
Steve’s stomach twisted when he scented something other than musty carpet and
muddy Avengers in the air.
No, this was the unmistakably sweet scent of an Omega going into heat.
Steve felt himself grow hard in response, body prepared to assist the Omega, to
spread his genes, and he wondered briefly if anyone would notice if he lifted
his shield into his lap, and the hairs on the back of his neck rose.
He kept flicking his eyes around the room, and it doesn’t take Tony long to
glance up, eyebrows scrunched up in confusion. So he can smell it too. Their
eyes lock, and Steve can’t look away. Something gnaws at his stomach, and his
shoulders stiffen, and ears flatten against his skull. His lips draw back a
touch in a silent snarl. It’s his pack, and he won’t back down to Tony for an
Omega.
Tony shrunk in his seat, slipping down, and his ears drooped. He then shook
himself abruptly, just a tiny shiver, and he was sitting up ramrod straight
again, but he looked terrified.
Like he was scared that Steve was going to—
Steve stood abruptly and walked out, completely ignoring the stares from the
others.
Shit shit shit shit shit.
Tony was terrified because he was the Omega. Tony was going into heat and only
Steve could tell because of the stupid serum and his stupid enhanced senses.
He ducked into an empty office and put his shield on the desk. The smell had
seemed to chase him, or it had clung to his uniform. He breathed in deeply and
allowed himself to growl in the back of his throat. He wanted, so desperately,
to go back and drag Tony back out with him before another Alpha, Thor or
goodness is Natasha an Alpha? That’s probably one of those things that no one
knew. But he desperately wanted to take Tony somewhere private where they could
mate and—
Steve shook his head. That was a stupid fantasy, and had no place on their
team. And the look Tony had given him, the fright and panic. What had happened
to him to make him so scared of Alphas?, to the point where he pretends to be
one to avoid close contact with another.
Practically, he knew that if he and Tony mated, and on the ridiculously off
chance bonded, then Steve would never be able to send Tony back into the field
again, and tactically, he needed Iron Man. It had been hard enough allowing
Bucky into the field after Steve got him back and they weren’t even bonded, and
Steve knew that he wouldn’t be able to handle losing another mate because of
one of his stupid mistakes.
And Tony was a jerk.
Mostly.
Sort of.
An argument could be made for misunderstood.
Six, no, seven times out of ten.
Steve left the room and wound his way through the helicarrier to the deck, and
walked around on the higher half of the deck until the rest of the team emerged
into the fading sunlight also.
Tony launched almost immediately, and sped back towards the mansion presumably,
Thor followed suit with Natasha clinging to his shoulders tightly, and Janet
followed them, buzzing around Steve’s head long enough to shrug at him.
Bruce was giving Clint a piggy-back ride, and it was them that Steve followed
to a helicopter, and Clint flew them back to the mansion.
“What happened back there?” Clint asked. Steve was sitting in the co-pilot’s
seat, and Bruce in the hold of the Quinjet.
He couldn’t really think of a suitable lie on the spot, so he’d have to settle
for an unsuitable one. “I thought I heard something outside, but I was wrong.”
Bruce pinches the bridge of his nose and looks away, “Alright, let’s go.”
Clint doesn’t argue at all.
 
 
ALT! Chapter 15 ish whatever it’s not canon anymore but let’s face it this was
fun to write even if Steve isn’t too clever
Being alert is a thing that he will never really grow out of. He notices
things, and its saved his life before, several times. So when he first notices
the black sedan, he doesn't stop jogging, he's only gotten a few miles in, just
to Central Park so far, but he does notice that its following him.
It could just be chance, but the chances of that are... Low, to say in the
least. It could be a government car; he had been approached by so many war
generals that even he has trouble remembering all their names, or its SHIELD,
which is ok, but it means the world is ending, or alternately, it someone who
has found out who he is (not ridiculously difficult, seeing as he kept his own
name, and all the basic information from Project Rebirth became public after
the war), and intend to do him harm. He comes to a stop under a tree, to shield
his eyes from the harsh sunlight, no point trying to avoid the inevitable
outcome, to wait for the car.
It pulls up beside him, and the rear door swings open. He catches a glimpse of
a slender hand, slipping away from the door handle, into the dark interior of
the car. He approaches, and sniffs as inconspicuously as he can, and can't
detect any hint of malice, and so gets in the car.
Natasha is sitting in the back seat, typing rapidly with one hand on a phone,
whilst the other is resting in her lap. She nods, to him, he thinks.
"Natasha." He acknowledges. She has been absent for the last few weeks, on
official SHIELD business. She's relaxed in her seat, all sweeping lines and
soft curves that makes the artist in him weep, nonchalant, inattentive, and so,
so dangerous. She, and by extension, the car, smell faintly sweet, as if she's
been near an Omega recently. The scent was vaguely familiar, but he couldn't
pin it down.
She launches straight into the deep end, and for that, Steve's grateful.
"S.H.I.E.L.D. has been tracking a threat to the United Nations, and a tactical
decision has been made for you to bring him in."
"Fury doesn't want me to kill him?"
"Actually, he does. But you're not going to do that."
"Do you think that's something I'd do, or is it what you want?" Steve wouldn't
put it past Natasha to use him for her own gains.
"I think it's what you want." She doesn't give him time to think about it, and
hands him a Stark Pad. "This is the Winter Soldier. Russian Special Forces.
He's neutralised every agent we've sent after him so far."
"So I'm going."
"There's a new suit for you. Stark designed it."
That's a reasonable motive, right?
Nah, he just needs to get out more.
 
Natasha comes with him, to an ocean liner full of shipping containers. They're
in a S.H.I.E.L.D. issue jet some fifty meters above the water.
"
Steve just smiles, and jumps from the hangar. It's a four second drop into icy
water, twenty second swim, ten second climb, and then he's warm again as he
swings his shield into the face of an unsuspecting guard.
Natasha plays catch up, and when they're off the deck and inside the hatch, she
speaks, whilst picking the lock to the next door. "What about that pretty
blonde Omega at S.H.I.E.L.D.?"
"Natasha, stop trying to set me up with people! It's bad enough that Tony gave
me a dog."
"Stark gave you a dog?"
"Labrador cross puppy. Apparently it doesn't drop fur, so that's a plus."
"Adorable." Natasha coos mockingly. "You should get with Stark then."
"No?" That came out more as a question than Steve wanted.
There's no time to talk then, because Natasha's picked the lock and they're
slipping into the hold of the ship.
It's, in short, a disaster.
The Winter Soldier isn't there, Steve earns a bruise in the ribs when one
slightly more clever soldier kicks the door shut as he's going through it.
Natasha swears herself blue in the face and they steal a small motorboat to
escape. Steve fiddles with his radio, and only hopes a little bit that they'll
be picked up.
~~~~~~~
Natasha smirks. "We can do that, right?"
They’re reviewing video footage of The Winter Soldier, an explosion had sent a
burning car at him, and he just sidestepped it. Like it was a toy.
“Throw a car at him, or dodge it?”
“You could throw the car, I’ll set it on fire.”
“This isn’t even a viable option, look at the tape! It didn’t even faze him.”
“Can we just try to throw a vehicle at him?”
“You’re not going to shut up about this, are you?”
 
2014
After the serum, and getting thrown seven decades into the future and
surviving, Steve wasn’t easily surprised. Except maybe if Tony came up and
grabbed his crotch without warning. That would be surprising, because Tony was
doing a damn good impression of hating him at the time. And had done since they
had first laid eyes on each other.
If the serum hadn’t enhanced his sense of smell even more than it already was,
he would never have guessed that Tony was an Omega. As it was, he didn’t
realise until he dropped by Stark Tower to pick up some tech that Tony had been
working on for S.H.I.E.L.D., and had smelt the heat from the foyer.
He wasn’t quite sure how he managed to keep a straight face, and took the
stairs, not sure if he could trust himself in an elevator that reeked of Tony,
and got the tech and got out unscathed, albeit a little aroused. He had wished,
not for the first time, that he still had Bucky, but settled for a cold shower
once he got back to his apartment in Brooklyn.
Right now, he was striding down one of the corridors of the Helicarrier,
following Maria Hill and Director Fury somewhere. He hadn’t been told much,
only that he was required urgently. So urgently, in fact, that Clint had shown
up a few minutes later in a nondescript S.H.I.E.L.D. jeep to get him to the
Helicarrier.
“In here please, Captain Rogers.”
Steve withdrew his hands from his jacket pockets and allowed Maria to usher him
into the room. It was a room he was familiar with, it was the observer’s room
for interrogations. He had been inside both this room and the room it was
separated from by a one-way window when they tried to interrogate Loki, a few
months prior. Tried being the operative word here. Then Dr Doom, and he had
even been interrogated at one point. Well, he had a calm discussion with Agent
Hill, more of a psychology session to make sure that he was not inhabited by
Loki or something. Routine business.
But now, there was a man tied, chained actually, to the solid chair in the
room, chin tucked to his chest. His left arm gleamed under the fluorescent
lighting. Steve recognised him. Steve had actually arrested, detained might be
the right words here. He had detained the man a few days ago. His back was
still a little stiff in the mornings from the fight. That metal arm sure packed
a punch.
“Well?” Steve glanced away from the dark haired man in the interrogation room,
and at Fury. “Who is he?”
“We were hoping you could tell us.” Fury threw something at him, and he caught
it deftly. It was a scratched set of dog tags. He checked them.
His dog tags. From a long, long time ago.
Steve frowned. “Where did you get these?”
Fury just pointed at the man in the room.
“Can I go in there?” Steve’s stomach churned nervously, and Fury inclined his
head.
Steve briskly left the room, and moments later, he was under the fluorescent
lighting too, the door being bolted loudly behind him. His ears twitched in
response to the noise, and the brunet didn’t move at all, but a faint sheen of
sweat covered his bare chest.
“Hello?” Steve crouched in front of the man, feeling hypersensitive. He was
holding the dog tags so tightly they were digging painfully into his palm, the
lights seemed too bright and glary, and the room was permeated with a thick
sweet Omega odour that he associated with a memory that occurred decades ago.
“My name is Steven Rogers.”
The man’s eyes snapped open, and he started struggling against the chains,
straining to get to Steve. Steve stood and leapt back, just in case.
“Please, I just want to talk.”
The man fell still and raised his head, and Steve’s breath caught in his
throat. “Then talk.” He snarled.
Steve held the chain aloft, and let the dog tags fall from his hand. They swung
from side to side. “Where did you get these?”
“I’ve always had them.” The man’s eyes followed the tags as if hypnotised. “Can
I have them back?”
Steve slowly walked a little closer. “Why?” He scooped them into his pocket,
and the Omega snarled and tossed his head back, clearing his face of his long
hair. The face looked achingly familiar, but it was impossible.
“They’re mine.”
“No, they’re not.” Steve caught the man’s gaze, and found it to be painfully
recognisable. “What’s your name?”
“The Winter Soldier.”
Steve shook his head. “No, that’s your code name, just like I’m Captain
America. What’s your real name?”
The Omega’s ears flattened into his hair, judging by the movement and Steve
could hear chains rattling quietly, and considering the Winter Soldier wasn’t
moving, it must’ve been his tail swishing from side to side. He shook his head.
Steve walked around behind him, invading the Omega’s space, and threaded his
hands through the thick hair. He squatted down so his mouth was level with the
Soldier’s ear. “What is your name?” He insisted, lowering his voice to the tone
he had heard an Alpha use on an Omega once during his training. His voice did
something to the brunet, and he shuddered, leaning his head back, baring his
throat.
Submitting.
“Barnes.” He whispered, for Steve’s ears only.
The bottom of Steve’s stomach dropped out, and he shot to the door, banging on
it with his fist. The moment it was open, he sprinted down the hall to the
nearest bathroom and leant over the sink when his stomach emptied itself.
God no, no, not Bucky. Bucky couldn’t be dragged back into this now. He was
just getting used to the idea of waking without Bucky’s warm arm thrown
casually over his back, just getting used to the idea of working with the
Avengers, of glancing at Tony and feeling butterflies fill his stomach without
reason, of trusting his back to a pair of assassins who probably didn’t even
remember their given names, giggling with Janet when Hank had lost his latest
experiment through shrinkage, and here he was, being thrown neck deep in
painful memories, forced to relieve every detail, screaming himself hoarse
after Bucky fell from the train. Steve had thought him dead, just like he had
thought Peggy dead until he was given the file that proved that she was
inactive, old (96), married, with grandchildren, great grandchildren. It would
have been easier for him if she had’ve just died, instead of finding out that
she had moved on, but in truth, he had moved on too.
He flinched when someone laid a hand on his shoulder, and wiped his mouth with
the back of his hand. When he turned, he saw Natasha standing there, silent and
appraising, as she was, but deathly pale.
“Is everything okay?” He asked her. It would take a one-on-one encounter with
the Hulk to make Natasha like this, and Bruce was in Puerto Rico right now,
back to his medicine or working with gamma victims there, so why was Natasha
disturbed?
She nodded, but it was clear she was lying. Her short tail flicked from side to
side impatiently. “What about you?” she rubbed his shoulder and her hand
dropped.
“Reliving old memories.” Steve admitted. “I should go back.” Fury would not be
happy with him. Natasha offered to come with him, and Steve accepted. He didn’t
go into the room with Bucky, he went into the observer’s room, and handed the
dog tags back to Fury. “Sorry.” Fury just waved, dismissing Steve’s unusual
behaviour, and Natasha huddled into his side, both of them looking at Bucky. He
stroked her head, rubbing his thumb over the rough edges of her clipped ears,
and she abruptly jerked away from him.
“I need to go in there.” She declared.
“Do you want me to come?” Steve offered. She turned away, but didn’t say no.
Steve followed her back into the room that was playing host to Bucky.
She left him the moment the door was locked, and knelt in front of Bucky,
reaching up to push her hands through his hair, lingering at his ears. “James?”
She asked, pulling his head up. Steve flinched. How did Natasha know Bucky?
When had they met, and what did they have between them? Steve forced his
possessiveness over his old friend down, and crossed his arms. “Hey, are you
allowed to talk to me?”
Bucky shook his head.
“Are you allowed to talk to Steve?”
Another shake of the head, and Natasha switched to Russian, said a phrase, and
Bucky stiffened, before falling completely lax in his restraints. The brunet
seemed like a different person now, more like Steve knew him before putting
himself in the ice.
“James?”
Bucky’s eyes snapped to Natasha, and he smiled faintly. “Tash,” He murmured
fondly. “Tash you’re okay.” His hands strained behind his back.
Steve shifted a little. It felt like he was intruding now. Bucky’s eyes turned
to him, and he spoke in disbelief.
“Oh. You… you’re Captain America.”
“Yeah.” Steve didn’t move. His throat closed over, and he wasn’t able to reply
past that. Did Bucky not remember him? After everything they had gone through,
every time Bucky had helped him, gotten him out of a fight, saved his life, all
of that just… gone.
Natasha seemed to notice that the way Bucky spoke, or what he said, distressed
Steve. A lot. “James, you know Steve?”
“Hi there.” Bucky flashed him a grin, and nodded his head in replacement of a
wave.
Steve tried to say something, but the intercom crackled to life. “Romanova,
Rogers, report.” The electric current running through the glass flicked off and
Fury tapped on the glass to attain their attention.
Natasha grabbed Steve’s arm and pulled him out of the room.
She didn’t go straight to Fury, instead, she dug her fingers into Steve’s bicep
and snarled at him. “What does James mean to you?”
“You’ve read my file.” Steve replied automatically. He wasn’t going to just
reveal the depth of his relationship with Bucky. “He was my mate. I thought he
died saving my life. Thanks for telling me he was alive.” Steve wrenched
himself free, but before he could return to Fury, the man himself opened the
door and stepped into the corridor.
“Agent Romanova, I’m pulling you from active duty,” was the first thing he
said, “Rogers, you’re to bring Stark here tomorrow at 0800, and when Barton
brings Banner back, Stark and Banner can have a field day with the lie
detector.”
“Sir, I’m not even going to bullshit my way around this one. Why the fuck are
you taking me off duty?” Steve pretended that that didn’t nearly make him
laugh.
“You said he was dead!” Fury’s sudden anger shocked Steve.
“They told me he was dead!” Natasha screamed right back at him, flinging an arm
in the direction of the interrogation room. She clenched her fists, and for a
moment, Steve thought that she was going to attack Fury, but she backed off,
took a deep breath. That was the most emotional Steve had ever seen her. “Last
time I heard, S.H.I.E.L.D. had a hand in the Red Room. Why didn’t you know
already?”
Fury didn’t answer that. “Romanova, return to your quarters now. Rogers,
dismissed. Go get Stark.”
Steve saluted briefly, and traced his steps all the way back to the deck of the
Helicarrier.
 
Steve did as ordered, and bought Tony back to the Helicarrier the next morning.
He had to threaten to pick Tony up and carry him there if he had to. Luckily,
Tony agreed to being dragged out of the workshop at an ‘obscene hour’, as if
Steve had disturbed him at three in the morning.
Tony didn’t bother trying to pretend that they could get along for the half
hour helicopter ride to the Helicarrier, ears flat against his skull, pacing
from side to side in what space there was in the back of the vehicle. Steve
just sat in one of the seats, loosely buckled in, and didn’t say how unsafe it
was for Tony to be standing, because Clint was piloting and Tony would scoff
and throw it all in his face; ‘what are you, my Alpha?’, how Steve wasn’t
anyone’s Alpha, and that would hurt a lot, because they were just going to see
Bucky now and if Steve had’ve done things differently, they he would have
someone to call his, someone to protect.
Fury was waiting for them on the deck, Bruce just behind him, cleaning his
glasses on the hem of his shirt. He did that a lot when he was nervous.
Tony sauntered off the helicopter as if he owned the place, and he had designed
it, so close enough, and approached Bruce, asking him how his holiday had been.
Clint and Steve followed, and Fury took them down to the interrogation rooms.
“So Captain Capsicle didn’t tell me why I was here.” Tony jogged ahead and
tried to loop his arm over the taller Fury’s shoulder. Fury shrugged him off
and gave him a stern look. Tony didn’t back away, but he didn’t try anything
else.
“We have a person in custody, and we need Banner and yourself to interrogate
him.”
Tony rubbed his hands together gleefully. He did rather enjoy playing all
intimidating-Alpha when he got to use the lie detector but… “Doesn’t Natasha
usually do that kind of thing?” Tony didn’t notice Steve, Clint and Fury
stiffen slightly.
“Something urgent came up, and she is otherwise occupied.” Fury said icily, his
tone effectively killing any urge in Tony to ask further questions. They
stopped outside the interrogation room where a young Beta agent was standing
with a trolley covered by a white sheet. “All yours. Captain Rogers will
provide you with the control questions.” Fury went into the observation room
with Clint.
Steve opened the door and ushered the Beta and Bruce inside with the equipment,
but grabbed Tony’s elbow before he could follow. Tony glared at him, but Steve
stood tall and glared right back, and let the door swing shut.
“What?” Tony stepped into Steve’s personal space, a trick that usually worked
on people who thought he was an Alpha, but he probably didn’t know that Steve
knew he was an Omega, so it backfired when Steve growled at him, low in his
throat, and Tony backed away, a little fearful, and pride slightly damaged.
“That man in there was very important to me. Do not hurt him in any way.”
“Yes mum.” Tony rolled his eyes and it was clear that Tony didn’t give two
hoots, but he had been warned now, meaning that Steve wasn’t liable for any
injury that came to Tony as a direct result of him interrogating Bucky.
The moment he stepped in the room behind Tony, he was aware that Bucky was
staring at him. He squared his jaw and paced over to where Bruce was fiddling
with a few dials. Tony was standing behind in a corner, his eyes fixed on the
Winter Soldier’s form, possibly trying to figure out what made him so important
to Steve.
Steve made the mistake of looking at Bucky, from the sad, plaintive look on his
face, to the metal arm, his left arm. Something in Steve’s chest throbbed
painfully. He had always left his marks on Bucky’s left arm, always, and by the
time Bucky had plummeted to his ‘death’ from the train, the mark had been all
but permanent.
When Bruce tried to attach the nodes to Bucky’s skin, the Soldier struggled and
strained away from the physicist. Bruce gave up and looked at Steve, who
shrugged and stepped closer.
Banner handed him the terminals, and Steve knelt in front of Bucky, unsure
where they were supposed to go. Bruce told him where, and whenever Bucky
struggled Steve didn’t hesitate to use his Alpha’s presence to force him to
stop, even if it made Steve die a little on the inside every time he had to do
it.
When all the nodes were attached, Steve reached out and rubbed Bucky’s ear
between his fingers, and realised, aghast, that they were clipped, like
Natasha’s. “Good boy.” He murmured. Bucky almost purred.
“Ready?” Tony bounced into Steve’s view, and placed himself between Bucky and
the blond. “What are we asking him?”
“Fury’s questions are here.” Banner waved a sheet of paper. “But we need to
calibrate the machine. Steve?”
There was a chair in the corner of the room, and Steve pulled it over,
straddling it so his forearms were leaning on the high back. Tony stood just
behind him.
“James?” Steve wasn’t quite sure what he was supposed to do. Bucky’s head
snapped towards him. “Can you tell me your full name please?”
Bucky fidgeted, hesitated, and then answered. “James Buchanan Barnes.”
In his peripheral vision, Steve could see Bruce adjusting his glasses and
nodding. He continued. “Do you know my name?”
Bucky frowned, and the chains holding him rattled a little. “You’re Steve
Rogers, aren’t you?”
Steve nodded. He wasn’t sure what to ask Bucky now, how much did he remember?
He clearly didn’t remember Steve at all. Maybe it was worth a try. Maybe he
didn’t remember anything from after he joined the army. “Can you tell me why
the teacher beat you when you were in junior year?”
Bucky’s brow really did scrunch up then, and he closed his eyes, tucked his
chin to his chest. “Did… I… I think I punched an Alpha in the face.”
“Steve?” Bruce looked at the blond when Steve didn’t confirm or deny it.
“Yes, he’s right. Mr Mayfield caned him for it.”
Tony laughed and stepped around Steve, and went to ruffle Bucky’s hair. “Tough
little Omega.” When Tony was close enough, Bucky lunged and tried to bite the
genius’ hand, and Tony jerked it away.
“Stay the fuck away from me.” Bucky growled at Tony.
“Umm…” Steve should
probably mention one thing… “Buc—James wasn’t an Omega when he punched the
Alpha in the face. He was a Beta.” Tony whirled and frowned at Steve.
“Not possible.” Tony declared immediately.
Steve shrugged. “I hadn’t phased yet and the guy was about to break my ribs.”
Steve neglected to mention that Bucky was an Omega when he fell from the train.

He neglected to mention how Bucky was probably pregnant when he fell off the
train.
“I want blood samples.”
“Tony, now is not the time.” Banner threw something at Tony and it hit him in
the side of the head. “We need a lie, and then it’s calibrated. We can start
with the proper questions after that.”
“Alright…” Steve frowned, tried to think of something that he could force Bucky
to lie about.
Bucky looked over at Bruce, appearing somewhat amused and calm, despite the
fact that he had been tied to a chair for at least twenty-four hours. “I have
never killed anyone in my life.” He said plainly.
“Umm…” Bruce peered closely at the screen. “Okay…” he made a garbled groaning
sound. “Steve does he smell any different?”
“No.” He smelt just as he had the last time Steve had woken next to Bucky, his
arm thrown over the brunet’s back instead of the other way around, but a little
more metallic.
Bruce studied his results a little more. “Okay, got it. Slight depression in
heart rate and blood pressure. All systems are go.”
Tony nudged Steve out of his chair after getting Fury’s questions, and sat as
Steve had. He rested his chin on the back of the chair instead, and rested his
wrists on his knees, the chair’s back supporting his entire weight. He smoothed
out the sheet of questions, and started.
Some questions, not even Steve could force Bucky to answer, even after Bucky’s
head had fallen back on his shoulder in submission, Steve’s fingers settled in
his hair. Most of those questions were about his handler, or people he knew
after he joined the army. He didn’t remember Steve at all, and Steve stonily
stared at the way the light played on the metal arm and wished that he had been
a split second faster on that train.
When Tony folded the paper back on itself so he’d be reading from the top of
the page again, Bucky whined and pressed his cheek into Steve’s neck. Steve
could smell his hair very easily from here, thick and sweet. Very nice. Steve
rubbed Bucky’s head and ears. “It’s alright, just a few more questions.” Steve
tried to assure him, but it was clear a few questions later that something was
really bothering Steve’s old friend. “Hang on Tony.” Steve called a stop when
Bucky refused to answer three questions in a row, even ones that he had already
answered. What was left of Bucky’s tail shivered against his leg, and Steve
scooted around so he could see Bucky’s face. “Are you alright?” Bucky’s whole
body shuddered, and he shook his head sharply.
“Head hurts.”
“Okay, can you tell me why?”
“It’s cold.” Bucky shuddered, and drew in a shaky breath. “I need Tash,
please.” He did, his head hurt, his body hurt and he felt hot and cold at the
same time, and she always made it better, she always had. She would know what
to do.
“I can’t get her, Bucky.”
When Steve said this to him, something snapped in him and he howled. It hurt,
it all hurt, every bit of it, and it was all too bright, even when he closed
his eyes. The name Bucky seemed right, but wrong at the same time, he was
certain that he had never been called it before, but now, he wasn’t so sure.
Someone touched him, fingers pressing into his hair, rubbing behind his ears,
and he wanted to lean into the touch, lose himself to the strong Alpha scent,
but everything hurt too much. It felt like he had fallen off a cliff, hit the
rocks again.
Again? He hadn’t fallen from a cliff before… had he?
After some time, he was aware that he was making noise, languages garbled and
meshed together in an inelegant mess. “Please, please get Tash I need her,
please it hurts.” He was crying, and someone was whimpering along with him—the
person touching his hair—and someone else was quietly snarling in the
background but he didn’t care. He just wanted Natasha. “I need her. It’s too
bright.”
The nodes on his skin were pulled off, and thumbs smoothed over the skin they
covered. Someone gently asked him to be quiet, it was all right now, it was all
over, and he did fall silent, but it wasn’t over. It still hurt, it was still
too bright and he was still alone, and then the fingers were gone from his
hair, and he was even more alone. The room fell silent save for his quiet
whimpers.
Steve stalked out of the room. It physically hurt him to see Bucky in so much
pain, screaming for Natasha, so he was going to get her. Tony followed, his
posture stiff, eyes narrowed behind his glasses. Banner stayed, and quietly
packed up the machine and tucked it in a corner for tomorrow. Steve wasn’t
going to force Bucky to answer any more questions until he wasn’t screaming in
pain.
Fury didn’t stop him from leaving, didn’t stop him from bringing Natasha back.
Tony followed him the whole time quietly and angrily murmuring things to
himself the whole time, but Steve hardly noticed him.
Natasha didn’t let anyone follow her in, and moments after she entered, Bruce
and the other agent were kicked out. Steve wanted to keep an eye on Bucky, and
went into the observation room, Tony and Bruce right behind him.
Natasha wasn’t near Bucky at all. She was instead, standing in front of the
window, staring directly at Fury. It was slightly unnerving mainly because she
couldn’t see through the window because it was a mirror on that side! She
gestured, miming turning a light switch off and Fury shook his head, frowning.
“I’m not turning it off.” He said into the intercom.
“Then turn the them down at least. Or I’ll break him out.”
Fury’s gaze didn’t waver, but he waved to a technician, who dimmed the lights
in the room. Natasha bowed stiffly at the waist and turned away. The
microphones in the room picked up even her whispers.
“Hey James,” Natasha rubbed her fingers through Bucky’s hair, crooning soft
words to him, promising that she would make it all better, she’d fix
everything. Steve was very aware of Clint, bristling by his side. Steve knew
that Clint and Natasha had some sort of arrangement, perhaps similar to what he
had with Bucky in high school, but then he realised that he wasn’t sure what
Natasha was. She had never told him her status, and her scent always changed.
He had found her smell to range from anything to seriously dominant Alpha, to
Omega in full heat (that was one time for a mission), and thus, he couldn’t
tell. So Clint could be bristling from anything from possessive rage, to
jealousy.
Steve was still trying to wrap his head around what society now accepted. It
still threw him to see Alphas submitting, willingly to others, or to go to a
shop, and see an Omega running the store. He thought it was a wonderful
advancement, society was getting out of its sexist rut, but it still threw him.
Natasha had finished calming Bucky down, he was almost asleep, drooling a
little, and Natasha was standing in front of the window again, staring at Fury.
“We can’t keep him in here.”
“Get out here, Romanova.” Fury told her.
A minute later, she was discussing how they ‘couldn’t leave James in here,’
explaining exactly why it was a bad idea from the word go, and how difficult
she would make things if they didn’t give Bucky some freedom.
“Agent, he is a hostile force, part of the Red Room project, if you think I’m
going to just let him out of my sight, think again.”
Natasha snarled and glared and Steve could see the silent battle going on
between them. Fury was trying to use his rank and biology to force Natasha into
submission, but Natasha was a very strong girl.
“Give him to Steve.”
“What?” Steve, Clint and Tony all turned to look at Natasha.
Fury actually looked like he might be about to concede to that. “That will
work.”
“No it won’t.” Steve had been about to say the exact same thing, but Tony beat
him to it. “Cap will be compromised. As a team, we can’t have that.”
“Like you can talk.” He wouldn’t be compromised. Not one bit, but he would find
it very difficult to care for someone who he knew so well, but who couldn’t
remember him at all.
“What’s that supposed to mean?” He tried not to feel satisfied that he had
gotten under Tony’s skin.
Just to spite Tony, he lifted his head. “I can take care of Bucky.” Tony
sounded like he was choking on something for a moment. “There are benefits.
He’s unbonded, I can smell it. If he bonds to a S.H.I.E.L.D. agent, it can only
be good.”
“You mean you.” Tony grumbled.
“What? No! Goodness, no.” It would be nice, but… “He’s not the same person as I
knew, and we didn’t bond before the war. It can’t happen.”
“It’s settled then.” Fury handed a set of keys to Steve. “Take him to the tower
tomorrow, after we’ve finished interrogating him, and you two can sort out
lodging.”
“Thank you, sir.” Natasha seemed bitter about Steve taking Bucky even though it
was her suggestion, but she must have concluded that it was better than
nothing.
Fury turned to Natasha. “You’re still on probation.”
 
Steve didn’t hang around for the interrogation. He didn’t want to see a repeat
performance of the previous day, and he wasn’t entirely sure if Tony would
appreciate him meddling. He slipped into the room after everyone had left. “Hey
James.” Steve crouched behind Bucky, and fitted the key Fury had given him into
one of the padlocks. “If I let you go, do you promise not to hurt anyone?”
“I’m not a child, Captain.”
Steve took Bucky’s wrists, wrapping the fingers of one hand around both, and
loosened the chains. “We’re going to take you to where I live for now. I might
be able to get Natasha to visit, but I don’t think you’ll be allowed to leave.”
He loosened the last of the chains and pushed them away, and they made a racket
when they slid to the concrete floor. “Can you stand?”
Steve had to provide support so Bucky could walk, and it felt like déjà vu.
Apparently Bucky thought the same thing.
“Taller…” He muttered. Steve smiled, and wrapped one of Bucky’s arms around his
neck to hold him upright.
“Yep. Come on. Let’s get you home.”
When they got to the door, Bucky suddenly felt a little lighter, and he puzzled
over Tony’s sudden aid. He pulled the door open, and helped Bucky limp down the
hall. A two days tied to a chair would make even Steve’s legs feel stiff and
weak, and then Steve had probably nearly broken Bucky’s leg when he hit it with
his shield.
“Fury said to take the Quinjet. Clint will fly us.” Tony was really too short
to be trying to carry Bucky, but Steve appreciated the notion.
“You don’t have to do this.” Steve felt goose bumps rise on his skin when he
leant forwards to look at Tony, and his shirt slipped down enough to let part
of Bucky’s metal arm slide against his skin.
“Neither do you.” Tony tried snapping at him, but Steve could hear that it
lacked bite. As it was, Tony’s ears were lax, rather than alert. 
“Is
everything alright with you?” Steve adjusted Bucky’s arm over his shoulders,
taking more of the weight.
“Totally, perfect, what’s it to you?”
“As your team leader, I can’t have you compromised.” Steve chose his words
carefully, mirroring what Tony had said about him yesterday.
“Well, I’m not.” Tony ducked out from under Bucky’s arm. He was walking with
far more ease now, and it was only Steve’s firm grip on his left hand that left
him half draped over the blond. “Haven’t had a scotch for three weeks, slept
for a few hours last night, ate breakfast. Can’t say the same for you.”
Steve checked his watch. Ten twenty. “Still morning.” He raised an eyebrow.
“Think you can walk?” He slowly let Bucky down, and when Bucky didn’t stumble,
he just kept his hand on the brunet’s shoulder to guide him to the deck. “You
know, I don’t actually need to eat for several days.”
“No one does.” Tony pointed out. “I’ve proved that several times.”
“Have you ever considered that the reason that you’re so short is because you
did week long stints without food when you were a teenager?”
Tony bristled, his tail hardly twitching. “Like you can talk.” He snapped,
suddenly defensive. “Have you seen what you looked like before the serum?
That’s the only reason you’re taller than me.”
Steve stopped, partly because they were just at the Quinjet, and partly because
Tony’s words stung. He didn’t think before he spoke next. “At least I know what
I am.” He ushered Bucky into the vehicle before he could regret his choice of
words, and before Tony could retaliate, and had buckled himself in before he
realised what he had just done. Tony was dead silent when he entered the hold
of the Quinjet. “Uhh, look, I’m sorry about what I said. That was rude.”
Tony didn’t reply, and Steve let Bucky take his bed, and slept on the couch
instead.
 
 
The winter soldier happens you guys don’t need me to recap it
 
Steve expects Bucky to come back after a while, a couple of months maybe. He
had started to remember after perhaps a week of being out of cryogenics,
according to Natasha, so he’d expect more after so long. He gives him three
months before going to find him.
I’m going to die, Steve thinks, his motorbike is directly on path to collide
with Bucky, (who for some reason (Sam) is rather angry), his shield propped on
the handlebars to protect himself from the gunfire. A few seconds before the
bike hits, he jumps up onto the seat, grabs his shield, and back-tucks off the
back of the bike. He lands just in time to see the Soldier leap up, land his
foot on the back of the seat, and launch himself at Steve. Steve ducks and
rolls, and somehow, somehow he is anticipated, and he is thrown across the
asphalt by the toe of the Soldier’s boot.
He rolls, and just knows that he isn’t going to get up quickly enough so brings
his shield around. The bang is deafening when the shield is punched. The impact
jars his shoulders.
He will not be ashamed to admit later that Natasha comes to his rescue.
 
“We can’t keep him in here.”
“Watch me.”
Steve has never seen Natasha so angry before, and it’s downright impressive.
He’s also never found someone so little so terrifying, and he’s never seen
anyone shout Fury down before, and that, he thinks, is even more impressive.
“Agent, he is a hostile force, part of the Hydra, if you think I’m going to
just let him out of my sight, think again.”
Natasha snarled and glared and Steve could see the silent battle going on
between them. Fury was trying to use his rank and biology to force Natasha into
submission, but Natasha was a very strong girl.
“Give him to Steve.”
“What?” Steve, Clint and Tony all turned to look at Natasha.
Fury actually looked like he might be about to concede to that. “That will
work.”
“No it won’t.” Steve had been about to say the exact same thing, but Tony beat
him to it. “Cap will be compromised. As a team, we can’t have that.”
“Like you can talk.” He wouldn’t be compromised. Not one bit, but he would find
it very difficult to care for someone who he knew so well, but who couldn’t
remember him at all.
“What’s that supposed to mean?” He tried not to feel satisfied that he had
gotten under Tony’s skin.
Just to spite Tony, he lifted his head. “I can take care of Bucky.” Tony
sounded like he was choking on something for a moment. “There are benefits.
He’s unbonded; I can smell it. If he bonds to an agent, it can only be good.”
“You mean you.” Tony grumbled.
“What? No! Goodness, no.” It would be nice, but… “He’s not the same person as I
knew, and we didn’t bond before the war. It can’t happen.”
“It’s settled then.” Fury handed a set of keys to Steve. “Take him to the tower
tomorrow, after we’ve finished interrogating him, and you two can sort out
lodging.”
“Thank you, sir.” Natasha seemed bitter about Steve taking Bucky even though it
was her suggestion, but she must have concluded that it was better than
nothing.
Fury turned to Natasha. “You’re still on probation.”
 
“Hey Bucky.” Steve crouched behind Bucky, and fitted the key Fury had given him
into one of the padlocks. “If I let you go, do you promise not to hurt anyone?”
“I’m not a child, Captain.”
Steve took Bucky’s wrists, wrapping the fingers of one hand around both, and
loosened the chains. “We’re going to take you to where I live for now. I might
be able to get Natasha to visit, but I don’t think you’ll be allowed to leave.”
He loosened the last of the chains and pushed them away, and they made a racket
when they slid to the concrete floor. “Can you stand?”
Steve had to provide support so Bucky could walk, and it felt like déjà vu.
Apparently Bucky thought the same thing.
“Taller…” He muttered. Steve smiled, and wrapped one of Bucky’s arms around his
neck to hold him upright.
“Yep. Come on. Let’s get you home.”
When they got to the door, Bucky suddenly felt a little lighter, and he puzzled
over Tony’s sudden aid. He pulled the door open, and helped Bucky limp down the
hall. A two days tied to a chair would make even Steve’s legs feel stiff and
weak, and then Steve had probably nearly broken Bucky’s leg when he hit it with
his shield.
“Fury said to take the Quinjet. Clint will fly us.” Tony was really too short
to be trying to carry Bucky, but Steve appreciated the notion.
“You don’t have to do this.” Steve felt goose bumps rise on his skin when he
leant forwards to look at Tony, and his shirt slipped down enough to let part
of Bucky’s metal arm slide against his skin.
“Neither do you.” Tony tried snapping at him, but Steve could hear that it
lacked bite. As it was, Tony’s ears were lax, rather than alert. 
“Is
everything alright with you?” Steve adjusted Bucky’s arm over his shoulders,
taking more of the weight.
“Totally, perfect, what’s it to you?”
“As your team leader, I can’t have you compromised.” Steve chose his words
carefully, mirroring what Tony had said about him earlier.
“Well, I’m not.” Tony ducked out from under Bucky’s arm. He was walking with
far more ease now, and it was only Steve’s firm grip on his left hand that left
him half draped over the blond. “Haven’t had a scotch for three weeks, slept
for a few hours last night, ate breakfast. Can’t say the same for you.”
Steve checked his watch. Ten twenty. “Still morning.” He raised an eyebrow.
“Think you can walk?” He slowly let Bucky down, and when Bucky didn’t stumble,
he just kept his hand on the brunet’s shoulder to guide him to the deck. “You
know, I don’t actually need to eat for several days.”
“No one does.” Tony pointed out. “I’ve proved that several times.”
“Have you ever considered that the reason that you’re so short is because you
did week long stints without food when you were a teenager?”
Tony bristled, his tail hardly twitching. “Like you can talk.” He snapped,
suddenly defensive. “Have you seen what you looked like before the serum?
That’s the only reason you’re taller than me.”
Steve stopped, partly because they were just at the Quinjet, and partly because
Tony’s words stung. He didn’t think before he spoke next. “At least I know what
I am.” He ushered Bucky into the vehicle before he could regret his choice of
words, and before Tony could retaliate, and had buckled himself in before he
realised what he had just done. Tony was dead silent when he entered the hold
of the Quinjet. “Uhh, look, I’m sorry about what I said. That was rude.”
Tony didn’t reply, and Steve let Bucky take his bed, and slept on the couch
instead.
 
If he thought that one Russian super-spy-person was bad enough, then he hadn’t
been anticipating the arrival of another one very well. It was worse that the
new one knew Natasha, and that Steve used to know him, before, you know, the
ice.
"America's great you know, coming up with the likes of you two." T
"Is that so?" S
"Yeah, must be the little bit of patriot within me." T
"Oh my god you didn't just say that." B
"You set me up for that." S
 
 
ABO II
Under the constant surveillance of Jarvis, they have very little opportunity to
spend time together. Apparently, it's not common knowledge that Natasha's his
daughter, so any time they want to talk, they have to go outside, or to
Natasha's room, which they did once, and had to answer a myriad of awkward
questions and he doesn't want to do that again because Natasha's mate (he's so
happy she found someone, considering... everything) wouldn't stay in the same
room as him for the next week, until Nat dragged him into the kitchen,
initiated emergency blackout on surveillance and sternly explained everything,
including that James was her mother (Clint had blanched at that, and paled,
James leered for effect, and laughed when Clint turned a delicate shade of
green.)
"Mat, stop scaring him."
He consented, and that was that. Sadly, the blackouts can only go for about a
minute before Tony investigates.
So Natasha shows him New York instead, and they talk out in the open. She tells
him about how she woke up without him, and they told her that he was dead, how
she got caught in Budapest, meeting Steve for the first time, she even admitted
that it was the first time she had ever been frightened, how even now, she's
scared even now that if she opens up to Clint that she'll bond to him despite
her unique biology.
"Hey, I know my memory's shot to bits, but it's amazing. I think. Maybe."
In return, he tells her what he can remember about Before. It isn't much, but
there's more each week.
He remembers school, remembers what a scrawny runt Steve had been, and he
remembers the army and being caught by Schmidt's men. That's about it for now.
Today though, he's posed with a slightly more physical issue. "My arm is
broken."
"Is this like last time when you went into heat and jammed three fingers
because of all the things that could make adamantium rust, it's Omega slick?"
"No. Damn, I forgot about that. No, like, it's playing up. Sometimes it all
seizes up, and others I can't control it and it kind of jerks around."
"Take it to Tony." She says.
"Yes, award for best idea goes to; Tash." He frowns. "It's bad enough that Tony
thinks I'm poaching his Alpha. He won't help me."
"They're not mated."
"Steve and Tony aren't... What? No, I thought they were bonded?"
Natasha barks out a laugh. "They are, that's what's so funny. Tony's got some
stupid Alpha complex, and Steve has so many issues that stem from you dying
that he doesn't know where to begin, and yes, I'm saying that you are
indirectly stopping Steve from moving on. You should be ashamed of yourself."
James feels his stomach twist. She might be joking, but she's right. "Yeah,
I'll ask him."
 
He gets face to face with Tony in his workshop before he realises that he's not
sure what to say. Well, he's always been good at making up some bullshit story
or another.
"Well? Out with it. I don't have all day." Tony's confrontational, and
aggressive, and James doesn't expect anything less. It's kind of hot.
"My arm's broken."
"Why is that my problem? Take it to Bruce."
James instinctively arcs back, and snarls. They're both too different as Omegas
to really clash horribly, Tash has just made him feel bad about approaching
Tony. "I'll rephrase that for you. It's not working properly, malfunctioning."
"What-"
He pulls his gloves off with his teeth, and then his jacket a little more
awkwardly. He drops it next to his gloves and pins Tony with a look.
"Oh." Tony is speechless for once, apparently. Something flashes across his
face, raw and intense. "Come here, Dumm-E, bring a stool over."
He's pushed onto the seat, and Tony stands in front of him and leans forwards
to peer at James' left arm. Tony kind of smells nice. James bears a grin for a
moment. Surely it's not possible...
"So what's wrong with it?" Tony's holding his arm out straight, bending each of
the fingers one by one, flexing the wrist. It sticks a little.
"That. The applications aren't working, the shoulder's sticking when I try to
put it back down."
"Does it come off?"
James puts his hand over the shoulder and pushes his fingers into the grooves
where the arm attaches. It whirs and clicks, and Tony's left holding an arm.
"Kinky." Tony leers at him lasciviously.
"That's what I said." He sighs dramatically. "Never had a chance to test it
like that though." He looks up, and Tony is standing between his knees, still
smirking. "I feel like I have to be a little more narcissistic to want you like
this."
"Good thing I fill the quota for both of us."
They're probably too close, shouldn't be doing this. Tony and Steve are bonded,
well, too stupid to realise they are, James is still bonded to Steve and knows
it won't be reciprocated. This is not the best idea he's ever had. It still
feels inherently right.
Tony breaks the distance and they crash together. James stands, he's taller
than Tony by a few inches, and he uses it to tower over him, grabs his hair,
and it's too much like fighting, too much like them.
Tony fights dirty too, he drops James' arm, it clatters loudly when it hits the
concrete, hands favouring to touch James instead, fingers twisting into his
singlet, and bites the soldier's lip, urges him backwards until a bench is
digging into the small of his back. He drops Tony's head and puts his hand on
the edge of the table, pushes back with teeth and body, demands more space. He
can taste blood and coconuts.
"Oh, yeah, okay, we can do this." Tony pulls away. He's flushed and panting,
and there is blood on his teeth and lips.
"Yeah." James reaches out and wipes some of the blood off Tony's lip. "I
promise I'm better in bed with two arms." He sticks his thumb in him mouth and
licks the blood off.
"Now you're just skipping the queue."
James reaches out and fits his hand around Tony's hip. Tugs him closer.
"Maybe," he laughs. He licks up Tony's jaw, presses the flat of his teeth to
the joint. "But it is my arm, I only have one of them."
"It probably just needs a tune up." And only Tony Stark could talk work whilst
pressing a hard on into his hip, hands fumbling to pull his shirt off. "Bit of
lube, good as-fuck!"
James hadn't heard the Avenger's alarm before, but it was unmistakable.
"I. Hate. New York." Tony turns and flings himself across the lab, dives his
hands into a shelf and pulls tubs off it, reads, and replaces them just as
quickly. He throws one at James, and calls for the Mark IX. It's a thing of
beauty, sleek lines, smooth joints, much like James' arm, but more functional.
Bigger. Flashier.
He is dressed in the suit up to his elbows, and the helmet is still waiting for
him, when he dashes back across the lab. He snatches the jar off James, and
demands for the arm. He smears some metallic gunk into the joints, manipulates
them quickly, with clear practice in the movements. "Here, should be right for
now."
James takes it back and clicks it into place. Feeling sparks up the arm and
through his shoulder, almost too intense. It's this that he hates most about
removing his arm.
When he blinks the stars out of his eyes, Tony's fully suited up, waiting,
apparently. "Hold on, we're flying Air Iron Man today."
"But I'm not an Avenger."
"Fuck that. You're bored and horny and just got cockblocked by some jerk arse
who wants to rule the world. Don't try to tell me that you don't want to hit
them."
"Can't argue with that." James steps forwards and does as Tony asked, and the
next thing he knows, they're soaring over New York, following the path of...
Skittles.
"Really?" Tony asks. "Are we facing Sargent Saccharine or something?" He's
obviously turned the comms on. He must get a reply, because they start a
descent, James is dropped to the ground, right between Natasha and Steve. She
takes one look at him, the healing bite and traces of blood on his lip, the
notable lack of jacket and gloves, and raises an eyebrow.
"Oh shut up." He sucks his bottom lip into his mouth to clean all the blood off
it.
"What's this? Bucky, why are you here?" Steve had turned his attention to them.
"Sassy pants made me."
"Replace 'sassy' with 'sexy', and you're on track." Tony lands next to them
with a clang, and stands. He's much taller in the suit. James wonders what it
would be like to be pinned and forced by the suit. He didn't think it would've
been a sex thing for him, but maybe it is.
"So what are these things?" Steve gestures to the ground.
"Skittles." James and Tony reply immediately.
"Totally harmless." James crouches and picks a few up. Ignoring Steve's mention
that he might be wrong and that they might be poisoned or something, he tips
them into his mouth. "Yeah, you know, the only thing I'm going to die of eating
these is a sugar overdose."
Steve swats him over the head. "Okay, Iron Man, contact S.H.I.E.L.D., tell them
not to send Hawkeye or Bruce, we'll start clean-up, and-"
The skittles bounce on the ground, and skitter around a bit. "And?" Tony
prompts.
"I think S.H.I.E.L.D. can do clean-up. We weed to find the source of these
things."
There's no Sargent Saccharine, but there is a machine that is unattended and
buried in candy. They have trouble clearing enough of the machine for Tony to
short it out, but it stops, and James eats enough candy to feel sick.
"I'm taking this home." Tony declares once they dig the machine out. It's
rather small, for something that produced several (hundred) tonnes of skittles
from nothing. "Imagine if Dumm-E could give me skittles when I wanted him to?"
"I didn't get to punch anyone." James laments.
 
"That was really anticlimactic." They're walking back, James has a pocketful of
skittles, although he's not really interested in eating them right now. It's
more the novelty of being able to say that he has a pocketful of skittles.
Also he ate too many skittles before and his stomach hurts.
"Compared to what?" Natasha has a sly grin plastered to her face.
"I've done recon more interesting than that." He points out, steering away from
what Nat wants to talk about. Steve is right there.
"How's your arm then?"
"What?" Steve glances over. "You didn't say anything was wrong with your arm."
"Nothing major, I swear. I'll take it back to Stark when we get back and he can
make sure that there's nothing wrong with it." James glares at his daughter.
Then realises how absurd this situation is. He laughs, and has to stop walking.
"You alright, James?" Natasha frowns gently.
He's not sure how to explain himself, so he just slips one arm around both of
their waists, and pulls them close. "I've missed you both."
Natasha fusses and pulls herself free when she's deemed them to have hugged for
long enough, but Steve doesn't. James sinks into the feeling and settles into a
soft smile. He could get used to this again. Natasha looks at them both for a
long moment, surveying, calculating. "Come on, I think it's story time back at
the tower."
"Story time. What?" James realises what she means and releases Steve abruptly.
"Nyet."
She lifts her chin and stands as tall as she can. She can't pull the age card
on him, but she can pull rank on him. He frowns against the Alpha pheromones
she's letting off.
"We have to tell him sooner or later." She's switched to Russian, good enough.
They start walking again.
"Tell him what?" He replies in kind. It was an accident that he had used
Russian just before, but it suits this well. "That you're his kid and I'm still
bonded to him and that sure, it's great and it gets me out of bed in the
mornings, but it sucks because I see him and Stark and I'm really happy that
they've bonded but I'm not because it hurts?"
"I wouldn't use those words..."
"Tash, he will feel obligated to stick with me if I say that, regardless of
what it will do to him or how it will make him feel."
"What's going on?" Steve's curiosity finally gets the better of him.
"Reminiscing." Natasha says instantly, easily slipping back to English.
"Sorry." She's got the sheepish act on, and anyone who didn't know her would
believe it.
When they get back to the tower, Steve goes to change, and James follows
Natasha to her room.
"I don't think we should tell him everything."
"Then what should we tell him?"
"That you're our kid. No, wait, hear me out. Bonds won't magically work if you
tell the people about them. If Steve knows he's bonded to Star-Tony, it won't
do anything but make him nervous and awkward. And there's something else..."
He's not sure what to say. It was an odd feeling. "When I went to see Tony
about my arm."
"So that's who bit you."
"In my defence, he started it."
"So, did you fight, or...?" She deliberately left it open.
"Or. But not just that, I've hardly spoken to him before, and he smelt really
nice,"
"Nice as in Alpha?"
"No, I could smell the Omega in him better than I should. It's like the way
Clint smells to you, I guess."
"I can't believe I'm going to say this, you being my mother and all, but I
think you should sleep with Stark."
"Is that a good idea?"
"Just do it."
 
"Sir, Sergeant Barnes is here to see you."
"Save. Let him in." Tony flicks the displays aside and spins his chair around
to face the door. "Haven't you been promoted yet?"
Barnes-Bucky, Tony supposes, that's what Steve calls him-smiles broadly. It's a
nice smile, if a little toothy. Sharkish. Predatory. "I have. But it's a bit
awkward having everyone call you 'Sergeant First Class Barnes' all the time. A
bit pratty, too." Bucky crosses the room.
"So, what can I do for you?" Tony rolls his chair closer and grabs Bucky's
wrist.
"Well, you did promise to fix my arm properly." He hums when Tony sniffs the
palm. He smells like musk and honey and sweat. "So we'll start there and see
what happens?"
"You'll have to leave it here and I'll rework it. Should only take a day or
two." He releases Bucky's hand and wriggles his fingers. The sergeant removes
the limb and hands it over. Tony puts it on the bench. "Scan that, create a
wire framework, and make a private folder to put it in, umm, call it Bucky for
now, coded to me and Sergeant Barnes only."
"Yes sir."
Tony presses into Bucky's space, who holds his ground and doesn't back off.
Tony doesn't budge, he's surprised that Bucky didn't move, and he still doesn't
move when Tony growls at him.
Tony wants Bucky, he's yet to explore the reasons behind it, and he's
attractive enough so he doesn't really care, but he wasn't expecting Bucky to
bite his mouth when he growled. Tony freezes, hands halfway to pushing him
away, but tongue follows teeth, and he shakes himself out of it and proceeds.
"Couch." He mumbles into the others' mouth. "Over there." He manoeuvres Bucky
to the wall and a bit to the left, to the couch that's hardly visible, mainly
because its covered with so much concrete dust an spare parts that is blends in
pretty well with the surroundings; an urban chameleon.
Tony kicks some of the junk off unceremoniously, and others a little more
carefully, some of it's important or fragile, and if spare Iron Man parts can't
handle being kicked off a couch with vengeance, then he's done something wrong.
Bought them up badly maybe. No respect for their parents, yada yada.
He turns back and grabs Bucky, and offsets him enough to drop him on the couch,
fine grey powder rising violently in protest.
"That can't be healthy." Bucky manages before Tony cuts him off. He uses his
shin to spread Bucky's legs apart, and kneels in front of him. Bucky reaches
out and cards his fingers through Tony's hair. Concrete dust filters out as it
unsettles.
"I could get used to this."
"Don't." Tony warns, it's probably not as effective as he could hope, because
he can't stop grinning. "But feel honoured, I don't usually go down on people
the first time." He works the button of Bucky's jeans, and thinks that he
should've done this before getting to the couch because fabric rarely settles
in an advantageous manner.
"Does that mean that this is going to happen more than once?" Bucky's voice is
very level and calm, and that's just not fair, considering Tony's breathing hot
air and a litany of promises across his prick, which is definitely getting
hard.
"I'll tell you later." He says, and keeps his teeth out of the way when he
takes the head of Bucky's cock into his mouth.
"Oh, fuck>." Tony hums merrily when he hears the thump of Bucky's hand hitting
the cushion. Except it showers them in a cloud of dust. "Shit, sorry." Bucky
stands, using his hand to push Tony back, away from the dusty couch, then away
from Bucky. He kneels too, spreads his knees apart until they're the same
height and breathing the same air. "Lock the door." He says, orders. Tony would
object, except he has no interest in stopping whatever it is they have started
due to a distraction on any smaller scale than the end of the world.
"J, lock down." It doesn't come out as a full sentence, not by a long shot,
obscured by Bucky's fingers in his mouth. They ignore Jarvis' demure 'yes,
sir', (sarcastic bastard) and when Tony goes to push Bucky down, he winds up on
his back, the soldier straddling his hips, fingers still in his mouth.
Fuck, that's hot.
And scary.
But mostly hot.
Tony scrabbles against the concrete, there's something sticking into his
shoulder, maybe a wrench of some variety, it's on that level of discomfort, so
it's likely, but gains no purchase, but decides that he doesn't really need
any, not when Bucky rolls his hips like that, and he's really got to thank
whoever taught him that because its a serious talent. Unless it's Steve, Steve
doesn't need thanking.
The fingers are gone from his mouth, and then Bucky's stripping his singlet
off, and Tony really wants to look at the housing where the arm fits into his
body but he also wants to do the sex, and the joint can wait so sex it is. He
sits up and drags his shirt off, tosses it aside, and looks back.
Bucky is compact, muscly in a small way. They're there, defined, but nowhere
near the comical over-the-top of Thor, or even Steve. He's got the wiry
strength of years of hard labour, fighting and tough periods of bad or little
nutrition.
Tony chuckles and presses his open mouth to a nipple, much like himself, he
supposes, except Bucky has the tell tail signs of an Omega who cares for
himself, enough pudge around the hips to grip on to, the healthy glowing skin,
whatever.
He leaves a trail of saliva across Bucky's chest to his neck, and sucks a mark
onto him just as the other is undoing Tony's jeans. He leans back with the
intent to inspect the mark, to see if its obvious or deep enough, but times it
badly, and his eyes flick down instead when Bucky takes him in hand and does
something that makes his hips jerk helplessly.
"Good?" But the tone of his voice suggests that he already knows what it's
like. "Never been with an Omega before, 's gonna be weird not having anything
shoved up my ass." He sniggers, and then his whole body shudders. Tony just
lets him do all the hard work and litters his neck and shoulders with little
marks.
He wants everyone else to know that Bucky isn't to be touched.
"Haven't done this for years." He finally says, more to a livid, purpling
bruise just over Bucky's heart than to Bucky himself.
"Done what?" Bucky's got both of them in hand now, pre come and spit making it
all a lot easier.
"Sex with clothes on." He strains to remember, must've been... "A girl called
Maya, I was twenty two and it was in Switzerland."
"Me too, the sex part, not the girl." He clarifies. Bucky’s neutral accent is
slipping, and some old Brooklyn drawl is slipping in. Tony’s hips jerk.
"Well, details." Tony huffs. He's trying to distract himself from the gradual
heat that's spreading through his body. He knows that if he submits to it he'll
come, and he would never let himself live it down if he came before Bucky.
Bucky groans and jerks his hips roughly, and Tony sees stars. "Switzerland,
'43, I went in-ter heat, and Steve fucked me agains’ a tree."
He doesn't get halfway through his explanation, before one or both of them lose
it, Tony's not sure, but when his brain reboots, Bucky's panting against the
soft underside of his jaw, which feels suspiciously wet and sore, and he
feels... Odd.
As it is, he still feels like he needs to come even though he knows he already
has; the sticky evidence is all over his stomach and jeans.
He feels full and less lonely.
When Bucky's breathing slows, he groans and presses his head into Tony's neck
even harder. "Fucking fuck."
Tony's got a vague idea of what happened. "Did we..."
"Yes." Bucky wraps his arm around Tony's waist, smearing semen across his skin.
"Nothing personal, but I really don't need this kind of complication in my
life."
"And you said that before I got to tell you that you're going to inherit a
Fortune 500 company if I die."
Bucky tips his head back and laughs openly, giddy warmth spreads through Tony.
"Could be worse," he says after a while, "you just inherited Tash."
"What."
"Natasha. If I die you're her legal guardian, providing that Steve doesn't want
custody."
"Oh my god." Tony ducks his head to look at Bucky in the eye. They're a nice
brown, the brown of oiled wood. Bucky looks away. "No, hey, you can't keep
secrets from me anymore. We're bon- shit. We're bonded." It hits him with what
feels like the force of a freight-train, and he struggles for air. "Shit. Shit
shit shit." He can't do bonded, he's got a life to live, things to build and
battles to fight. He can't spend every waking moment, and then some, worrying
about the intricacies of another person's wellbeing, when he can't keep himself
in check. He can't have someone in his head, knowing his every thought and
intention. Knowing how he really feels, knowing when he's lying.
He can already feel the throb of Bucky's mind pressed up alongside his own,
projecting confusion and contentedness and concern.
Bucky brings his hand up so he's cradling Tony's head, and shushes him with
mind and touch.
 
So. Existential crisis, check.
He can totally do this. He can do bonded to Bucky, he can do pretending to be
normal when he feels the urge to fucking snarl at Clint when he laughs at
whatever Bucky just told him, he can do ignoring how occasionally his mood will
abruptly alter and suddenly he feels like curling up and going to sleep, just
because Bucky's tired, he can do inexplicable pain and exhaustion probably
because Bucky's sparring or training or whatever.
He can't do the ridiculous pining.
Oh god, Bucky loves Steve so much, so much more than he loves Tony, so much
that it hurts, and he's not surprised, and he's okay with that, because he and
Bucky barely know each other, and then they had sex once and now they're bonded
and doing this all backwards, but when has Tony ever done stuff in increments,
and following the steps like he should? They're learning about each other,
about how Tony can be an insufferable ass and can make Bucky's mornings hell
because Tony hasn't slept and is more awake via caffeine rather than more
sensible means, about how Bucky broods over things that he's done, to the point
where Tony has to stop soldering because he's thinking more about shoving a
knife between someone's shoulder blades than his work, about how they both have
to stop what they're doing the moment one of them starts thinking about sex too
much, because they're both perfectly OK with feeding of each other's ideas,
whispering emotions to each other through their Bond, about what they would do
to each other, were Tony not overseeing (read: actually doing) the
reconstruction of something or a rather, and Bucky under his strict house
arrest, courtesy of S.H.I.E.L.D.
So he's okay with Bucky loving Steve, and he gets that Bucky's bonded to Steve,
but its entirely unfulfilled because Steve's not doing something, but Bucky's
shielded that thought process very well because he always stops thinking about
it before it gets any further.
But he's not okay with how he'll shake himself back to awareness when he
realises that he is staring at Steve with the kind of obsession that only The
Suits can garner, he's not okay with wondering, even abstractly, if Steve's
blush goes all the way down, not okay with catching himself thinking how
attractive, or hot, or sexy-whatever, Steve is.
Some part of him always feels smug when this happens, and he knows it's less
part of him, and more part of Bucky.
At least there hasn't been any battles yet.
At least no one (okay, being realistic, except Natasha) knows.
He can't possibly imagine having to explain this to Pepper...
Except he's going to have to, and is going to have to apply to the National
Bonded Registry.
Pepper's going to kill him.
At least Bucky is an Omega. If he were anything else, Tony would lose Stark
Industries, even if he's made Pepper CEO. Bond rights have changed, but not
that much.
The inheriting Natasha bit, however scares him more. Not because it's Natasha,
well, okay partly, it is, but it’s more because of what Bucky said. Steve
wouldn't inherit Natasha unless they were related, which makes Steve her
father, which seems wrong on all levels, but when he thinks about it, it seems
okay, so long as Steve knows.
Does Steve know? He must wonder about it so much that eventually Bucky gets
really angry and overwhelmingly tells him 'yes' through their bond, and Tony
has a headache for the rest of the day, and hopes that at least, Bucky's got
one too.
He's vindictive like that.
At least the make up sex is great.
There are lots of hickeys and teeth and Bucky has two arms, and Tony's never
been with anyone who can lift him up so easily, but it's really hot, and the
bonded part of the sex is even better, because nothing Bucky has to do can
surprise him, because it's flit through both their minds at least once already.

That and he can feel it when Bucky comes too, like feel, feel, not just feeling
the way he hitches and goes limp for a fraction of a second, the way he
vibrates when he hums.
Back to back orgasms whilst out of heat are as fun as fuck
It's fucking awesome, and if everyone misses the impossibly noticeable marks,
he's going to strangle someone. Because he had a (small) hickey for a few days
after last time, and sure, it was hidden under his jaw, and people were bound
to miss it, and Bucky healed up almost overnight, which sucked, but this time
he's certain that people are going to see that Bucky's been claimed.
He likes to rule through threats and not action.
Call it part of his Alpha complex.
 
"This is horrifying." Bucky admits the next time he and Tash get out of the
tower. He knows he's being dramatic, he knows that Natasha's about to call
bullshit on him, but it is, it's horrifying. He can't hide much from Stark
anymore, he's being forced to literally wear his heart on his sleeve.
"This is ridiculous." She retorts. "You're an adult. I shouldn't have to be
guiding you through this!"
And that's about as whiny she gets.
It's also all the warning he gets before she drops him on the spot. Not
literally. She just doesn't hang around later in the gym.
She leaves him in there, alone, with Steve and Tony, who are sparring.
This is not OK.
To the nth degree.
That's his Tony, and his Steve. And they're fighting, and he doesn't know who
to defend, should things get out of hand.
And he can't just stand around looking stupid, so he turns his back and
continues with his weights circuit. That doesn't block Tony from his head, and
he can feel the growing frustration in his Omega. Tony knows that Steve is
taking it easy on him, letting him get a punch or two in, and he's getting more
and more angry. Apparently, Steve is treating Tony like a child.
He drops the weight he's holding, nearly on his chest, catching it with his
prosthetic arm when his wrist flares in pain. He sets the bar back on the rack
and glances over, and Tony's standing, his wrist bent into an awkward position
by Steve's large paws. Several ways to escape flicker through his mind, and
Tony catches on to one and holds, and he twists, ducks, and kicks Steve's leg
out from under him. Steve retaliates, and Tony hits the mats as well, but a
little more soundly pinned than last time.
Bucky lets Steve have his moment of glory, but his shoulders are starting to
ache and Tony is not going to call it off anytime soon, so he calls out to
them. "Alright Steve, I think he's learnt his lesson." Steve loosens the hold
so that they stop hurting, but his brows tighten a little as he stares at the
back of Tony's neck.
"Tony, what is this?" Bucky feels Steve swell with curiosity, and he adjusts
his grip so one of his hands are free, and brushes the mark with his fingers.
Bucky resists the urge to snarl, and violent anger lances through him. He knows
that most of it comes from Tony, but a bit of it is from him to, and it scares
him that even for a moment, he wanted to attack Steve.
Steve leans down and sniffs the nape of Tony's neck. Tony squirms abruptly,
looking for an escape, he feels hedged in, trapped, they're drowning in Alpha
scent and water. Bucky shakes himself out of it and crosses over to them.
Steve smells again, and then jerks back, eyes wide. "You..." His tone isn't
accusatory, just surprised. His eyes flick up to Bucky.
He can feel the startled rabbiting of Tony's heart as if it were his own, and
he doesn't know what to do, because if he tells the truth, then he ruins all
chances of making things right between Tony and Steve, and that's the most
important thing, because neither he nor Tony will safely make it through more
than one heat without an Alpha. Sorry, without Steve, because Tony had to go
and bond with him, too.
Tony stiffens, and it's then that Bucky knows that there is no going back. And
he had been so careful so far.
"How the fuck do you keep that a secret?" Tony shouts. He slams his palm on the
ground. "Let me up, Rogers. Your mate and I need a chat."
Steve sits back so he's only pinning Tony's legs, and even then, only half
heartedly. Bucky would've had Steve on his back by now. Probably in a
chokehold. Tony doesn't do so, just squirms awkwardly.
"I don't need to know your weird kinks, Barnes."
Bucky thinks, very deliberately, about the feel of sex with Steve, the slow and
languid kind after the initial frenzy of heat, where he takes care of
everything because there is no energy to do anything but lay there and let him.
Because Steve knows how to make it good.
Tony splutters in his mind, scrambling to think of something else. Anything.
Because he doesn't want to admit that it's making him interested and a little
horny.
"I think I'm missing something." Steve declares, all innocent eyes and big
pouty lips. Bucky could kiss him... Bucky could watch Tony kiss him. "Are you
two having a conversation?" He gets an amused feel from Steve. Tony colours it
with a certain level of sarcastic uncaring that means he's really actually
interested in the fact that he can mutely sense what Steve's feeling.
Bucky stops thinking about sex, and looks up from Tony to Steve. "A spat, I
think." He's got to keep his head. He's been hiding very personal information
from both of them, and they're going to want to know everything. He has to find
a way to placate them both, without giving too much away. He takes a seat
beside them, and gestures for Steve to let Tony up.
Clint's hair is short and prickly under her fingers, familiar, and comforting.
His ears are a direct counterpoint to this, soft and silky, and its only
through a lot of training that Clint isn't actively pressing his head into her
palm as she rubs one softly.
Clint is sitting in the uncomfortable kind of chair that Fury reserves for his
visitors, she's standing behind him, Fury is behind his desk, and Phil is
standing just to her right, trying to pretend that this isn't the most unusual
conversation he's sat through.
He's been through a few.
"You lost me somewhere between Stark and Barnes bonding, and leaving them in
the gym together, alone, with Steve." Fury thinks it’s hilarious, just like she
does. At least he has the decency to be aware that it probably wasn't the best
thing to do.
"No, I don't think you missed anything, sir." She smiles demurely. She feels
Phil inch closer to her, and she shoots a glare at him. He freezes to the spot.
"Now, I'd hate to seem rude, but I did have my yearly plan set up so my heat
would start in a few hours, and these guys are getting a little twitchy.
They've only been waiting for a year and a half for it, and I think they'll be
too volatile to move soon."
"Get out. I don't want my office ruined. Again."
Her smile sweetens. "I had no part in that."
"We'll have to discuss the matter of the other three later. Just make sure you
get them all out in one piece. I hate to admit it, but they're valuable."
"I bet you all a tenner that Stark comes out with hickeys in the shape of
Steve's teeth." Clint pipes up.
 
Tony doesn't have hickeys in the shape of Steve's teeth, but he does look
confused a lot, and zones out even more.
Natasha doesn't know what Bucky told them, but nothing seems to have changed,
and that's worrying.
Steve wasn’t sure what shocked him more when he got to his room. The face that
Tony was sitting on his bed (naked) and not Bucky, or the smell. The heat smell
could be Bucky’s—the Omega had ridden out his last heat in Steve’s room because
Tony still hadn’t given him a room, and that had only been a few days ago
(Steve hadn’t gotten around to changing the sheets or airing the room yet)—or
it was Tony who was broadcasting the scent. More likely the latter. The scent
was too fresh, too appealing for him. He gripped the doorframe tightly, skin
stretching white across his knuckles.
“Umm… hi.” He closed his eyes briefly, hardly longer than a blink, and forced
his head clear. He couldn’t just jump on the bed and do things, what if Tony
decided that he didn’t want it after Steve knotted and Steve didn’t want that
kind of responsibility. “You know, I might just go and sleep on the couch
tonight. I don’t want to cause you any trouble.” He lingered for a moment
longer, enough to let the scent lodge in the back of his mind, slotting
alongside familiar and similar scents.
He turned, and forced himself to leave. The rest of the corridor smelt exactly
the same as his room did, and he forced himself to curtail the tentacles of
lust in his brain. He wasn’t going to just throw himself at the engineer
because Tony was in heat, and in his bed. Naked. It wasn’t that the tactic
wouldn’t work on him, he was just not going to do anything that an Omega didn’t
want.
He found that Bucky was in the gym already, on the floor below, and gave him a
wave before heading over to the chin up bar that Tony had reinforced last year
because Clint had a bet going that Steve couldn’t do a chin-up whilst weighted
down so Thor had clung to his hips like some over grown koala and Steve
succeeded, but the bar had not.
He had felt bad about it, though.
He collected two thirty kilo weights and swung himself up so his knees were
hooked over the bar, and curled himself up until his eyes were level with his
knees. He swung back down, the weights pulling his arms towards the earth.
And repeat.
“Rough night?” The next time he swung down, Bucky was standing in front of him.
Steve just grunted, and hauled himself back up.
The next time he looked at Bucky, the Omega was eyeing his whole body, probably
a habit, part of his Russian training. “You look a little… troubled there.” He
just caught Bucky gesturing towards his hips, and Steve grit his teeth and kept
moving.
“Nothing too bad.” Steve continued with his sit-ups. “You weren’t complaining
in Switzerland.”
Bucky was suddenly very close to him, smelling very warm, and sweet. “What
makes you think I’m complaining now?” Bucky’s hands were threaded through his
hair, cupping the back of his head. The metal fingers were cold against his
skin. Steve dropped both weights when the Winter Soldier crushed their lips
together, and grabbed his shoulders to steady himself.
Steve did his best to push Bucky away politely. They weren’t bonded, and Steve
was down here to bury his lust, not encourage it to grow.
Well, that and he didn’t want Bucky. Not that, really. He wanted Bucky around
as a friend, because Bucky was a great friend, and he was just getting his
memories back, piece by piece. But he didn’t want to be Bucky’s mate anymore.
That ship had sailed.
God, he’s bad at explaining this. He does want to be Bucky’s mate?
But he wanted to be Tony’s mate even more, and he might just be trying to do
the right thing by Tony, make their first mating when Tony wasn’t in heat. Or
at least be there at the start of Tony’s next heat, so Tony could make the
decision on a clear head. He’d feel absolutely awful if he got Tony pregnant by
accident, and Tony wanted nothing to do with him in the first place.
He feels selfish to want them both.
And Tony is still his best friend, too.
“You smell like Omega.”
“So do you.” Steve pointed out. “My room still smells like you.”
“Yeah, sorry about that, but that’s not my sce—”
“Bucky, I’m sorry, but I can’t do this. I won’t mate with someone I haven’t
bonded with again.”
Bucky scowled and pulled away, giving Steve plenty of space, leaving him with
blood pooling in his head, and an empty feeling in his stomach. “But you’re not
fucking Stark.”
“Tony and I are not bonded.”
Bucky sighed. “Steve, you’re beautiful, but you’re also incredibly dense.”
Bucky patted the underside of his arm and walked away. Steve righted himself,
screwed up his face in thought, and called after Bucky to wait.
 
Tony didn’t even try to pull his punches on the bag, even though his unshielded
knuckles were becoming bloodied and sore. Goodness knows he made a horrendous
mistake in going to Steve’s room last night. Of course Steve wouldn’t want him.
Steve had Bucky now, again, of course they would be bonded, mated, whatever.
Because Steve had so kindly helped Bucky out with his heat just last week, and
then fumbled for an excuse to leave as quickly as possible when Tony was in the
same situation. What the hell had he been thinking?
Oh, and he was locked out of his alcohol stashes, and his heat had been two
months late and it had thrown a spanner in the works, big time.
Hence the bag hitting until his knuckles bled. It was distracting. He would be
in his workshop, but he was locked out of that, too, until his heat was over.
Because he did stupid things with stupid objects in his workshop whilst in
heat.
He shouldn’t’ve let himself be led on so easily, all those hours where Steve
kipped on the couch whilst Tony worked, the times Steve completely disregarded
Tony’s personal space bubble which definitely exists, thank you very much, and
carried him upstairs, sometimes kicking and screaming, for sleep (proper sleep,
not half an hour on that ‘ratty old couch’, which Steve had spent more time
sleeping on than Tony, lately), and when Steve bought coffee down at Tony’s
request even though Tony had been joking the first time and Steve had followed
through five minutes later with a large mug of steaming coffee.
He was stupid and childish to even think that Steve was being more than kind
and considerate to his teammate.
His next punch slipped right off the bag, slicked with blood.
“Come here.”
Tony tensed and whirled around. Natasha was standing in the doorway holding a
small pink-with-white-spots bag.
“Jeez, Stark. I already know you’re desperately in heat. Don’t make me order
you.”
Tony pouted childishly. Was there anything that Natasha didn’t know? The smell
of sweat and Alpha in the training room was strong enough to even mask that of
an Omega in heat at this distance. He weighed up the odds that she would give
him a ‘hand’.
Very slim.
Was she even Alpha? She smelt very nice from over here.
“You won’t appreciate the infection you’ll get if you don’t cover those
scrapes.” She walked over to the table that held the exercise logs and started
unpacking things from the bag. “Your hands will blow up and you won’t be able
to work for a month. And don’t give me the mitosis crap. Once the bacteria’s in
you’re in trouble.”
Tony whined, and squirmed on the spot until his tail drooped and he slunk over
to Natasha, nuzzling his nose into the underside of her jaw when he was close
enough. Her fingers sunk into his hair, nails sharp points against his skull,
and pulled him away.
“Sit.” She ordered.
Tony almost fell to the floor, his body glad to have an order to follow, his
mind less pleased. Natasha joined him and took one of his hands.
“This heat is different.” She absently commented, somewhere between smearing
antiseptic on his knuckles and putting the tube back on the ground by her knee.
“Nonsense.” Tony pressed his thighs together more firmly, slightly embarrassed
by the smell he was giving off. It made him seem weak and pathetic. But he was
lying. This heat seemed worse than normal. Nothing he did seemed to help. He’d
tried all his usual courses of action to cope with it, and the only thing that
had had any effect so far was burying his head under Steve’s pillows, even
though they smelt like the remnants of Barnes’ heat than Steve himself.
He denied this information, blocked it from his head.
“Tony,” Natasha tightened the bandage on his knuckles, and Tony tried not to
wince, “there is no point trying to deny it.”
“’m not.” Tony let her push him over so he was lying on his back. He wanted to
resist, but his body ached to do something right, to please Natasha more. If he
wasn’t in heat, he’d stand and leave, but his fucking instincts wanted him to
behave.
Natasha petted his stomach, tracing the lines of his ribcage with the heel of
her palm. She crooned softly at him, gentle words that dulled the worst of his
need for someone to control him fully.
Abruptly, she stopped. “You don’t need me.”
“No,” Tony reached out and his wandering fingers found her ankle, “I don’t need
anyone, you’re just squishy and warm and give nice belly rubs.”
“Tony, being alone is horrible. You should know that by now.” She pushed his
hand off her ankle and shifted away. “You don’t have to heed this, but if he
makes you laugh once, and think twice, don’t let him go, because you’re both
not perfect, but you’re perfect for each other.”
“Yeah, thanks. I’ll just go and find Thor then, shall I?”
She smacked him across the forehead. “He won’t wait forever, he’s too broken
for that, and we need you both at your best, Stark.” She scooped the bandages
and antiseptic into her arms and left.
Behind her, Tony groaned pathetically and rubbed his crotch to relieve some of
the pressure.
“He’s all yours.” Natasha murmured, pausing by the door.
Steve just swallowed around the lump in his throat, watched Tony lay there and
shudder and gasp and shamelessly moan obscenities with his hand down his pants,
and left after a few minutes.
 
Natasha had seen men become broken in combat, had broken a few herself, James
included, and when she met Steve Rogers for the first time, she could see that
he wasn’t quite shattered, but there were some deep cracks in him.
She knew that everyone Steve knew was dead, just shadows in his peripherals,
long forgotten by most, hated by few.
Watching things between Tony and Steve from the sidelines was partly amusing,
but mostly irritating. They skirted around each other most of the time, because
if they didn’t, they either fought, or got on almost too well.
They struck at each other’s weak points with surgical precision that she
probably wouldn’t be able to achieve with such ease. With a handful of careless
words, they had driven a barbed knife through each other’s armour, and twisted
it.
It was all a bit like a car crash. But in slow motion.
They gravitated towards each other naturally, nowhere near polar opposites.
They were both very smart and pigheaded, insanely talented, and very, very
proud. Which is why Stark’s official file has him printed as an Alpha, but
Natasha doesn’t have his ‘official’ file in her collection. She had his actual
one, that proved, with the blood work, that he was Omega, that recounted how,
in Afghanistan, he had been forced into a heat, a vast rush of mitosis and cell
repair to keep him alive whilst Yinsen had operated on him, and then in the
week that followed, how he had been forced to mate with any capable Alpha in
the Ten-Rings camp in hopes of forcing a bond. Having Tony Stark bonded to one
of the terrorists would be very advantageous to them. Bond laws in third world
countries were still very ruthless and unfair for the person of a lower status.
His file also proved him sterile, side effect of the palladium poisoning, and
now, after her pen had scrawled the last few words under the addition notes
segment, Tony Stark had bonded to Steve Rogers. (And vice versa, but she hadn’t
edited Steve’s file yet.)
There was literally no way it hadn’t happened. They were too well attuned to
each other, avoided soft spots (most of the time), and Tony had even trusted
Steve with the release codes for his armour, and had trusted Steve with the
knowledge of how to replace the arc reactor’s core in a tight spot.
But there was no way they could’ve bonded, either. Natasha was yet to hear of
people bonding without mating first, or without going through severe emotional
trauma together.
Unless they had mated and Natasha had somehow, not found out. But that was so
unlikely that it was impossible. For one, she hadn’t been able to find any
footage of them doing anything even remotely sexual together, unless Steve
pinning Tony to the sparring mats twenty two times in a row counted, and then
Tony hadn’t been making lewd jokes (not really a tell-tale, he tells lewd jokes
anyway), and oh yeah, Steve had told her.
Despite all their bickering, and all the layers of armour wrapped around them
as a whole, they were a rather peculiar together.
She knew for a fact that Steve spent nearly as much time in the workshop as
Tony did, and she knew that Steve bought coffee down for Tony whenever he
asked, and everyone noticed that Tony was taking orders better in the field,
albeit still with his own personal self-sacrificing artistic flair. But he was
still following the orders Steve gave.
But she couldn’t understand why Tony refused to admit the obvious, and why
Steve didn’t just… actually, she knew why Steve wasn’t doing anything.
Sadly, it was her fault.
When she said that James should stay with Steve, she was hoping that Steve
wouldn’t be so noble and wouldn’t get so caught up in trying to get James’
memories back, (which he was doing an admirable job of, she had to note) or,
for that matter, to get so caught up in just taking care of her mother in
general. Damnit, she could’ve taken James back to the helicarrier and subdued
his heat herself, besides, technically, he wasn’t due for another two months or
so, and she was thrown off. Probably Stark’s fault for that. Omega heats tended
to synchronise with each other very quickly to ensure that the Alpha of the
pack would have enough energy to deal with multiple Omegas.
And Stark was in heat right now and she had tried setting them up. Of course it
wouldn’t work though. It was written on their files now; “world’s most clueless
bonded pair of boneheads.” Natasha put her pen aside and stood. There was time
for one more ploy before Stark’s heat was out, right?
 
“Steve, you have to do something for him.” Natasha dropped a friendly reminder
to Steve when she caught him in the kitchen next. “Haven’t you noticed it’s
worse this time?”
“Natasha, if he truly wishes for my help, he will ask for it himself.”
“What, and showing up naked in your room isn’t asking enough?”
“No, that’s acting on impulse. He did not ask me to stay, he did not say
anything at all.”
“Yeah, because you left, too red-faced and too quickly for him to have a chance
to.” She frowned at him. “Steve, really, I can promise he won’t reject you. You
have to remember he’s not the type of person to ask for help. He just doesn't
know how to.”
“And what if you’re wrong?” Steve put his dishes in the dishwasher neatly.
“What if he doesn’t want it, me, and I alienate him completely? He’s an
important part of the team. I need him here.”
“And if he really does need you, and you’re denying him what he, well, his body
needs,” she paused, and the pause was enough to convey what would probably
happen, “well, let’s say it will hurt you both, more than it will hurt your
pride trying.”Steve and Tony go out and they’re talking before the meal and
Steve isn’t paying attention and he goes to drink some of his cola an spills it
down his front and they can’t stop laughing, and they’re both so glad that they
just went to a quiet diner, and then giggle more because Tony fell over in his
workshop earlier that day, for literally no reason, he just kind of fell over.
Please drop_by_the_archive_and_comment to let the author know if you enjoyed
their work!