#in sparing him and going out to work cas actually weakened them i think

[shallowseeker]

I think this moment in 15x15 is doing something bad to Dean's psyche. It was just... such an (underappreciated?) psychological blow.

First, Dean was obviously waiting up for Cas and Jack. It's adorable.

But notice: Cas was leaving without saying goodbye again. Here, Cas's panicking, his keys already in hand as he rushes out to find a (heroic) solution.

///

Hearthbreakingly, Dean actually asks where Cas is going twice in this scene. He can't hide the anxiety creeping onto his face when he asks.

///

They make small talk about their daily works. Cas twirls and pockets his keys, but there's a blink-and-you'll-miss-it moment where Dean tracks the movement of the keys with nervousness:

///

Dean forgets himself in the small talk, still laboring under the false promise, that the unethical plan will get his freedom (and everyone else's). There's a millisecond of happiness.

THEN.

There's a big HUH??? He does the little head turn, the same one he will do in 15x18

//

Dean's anger rises, just a bit, alongside the panic.

The music swells and Dean, always clued in to when something is wrong, begins to get scared because Cas is scared. He flicks his eyes down to Cas in a panic, trying to understand what's happening, to him, to them.

//

There's a familiar sense of confusion and disbelief here, not wanting to believe the bad news Cas is delivering about leaving, about Jack, and visually and beats-wise, it's so soooo similar to how 15x18 goes down when Cas tells him the bad news about the deal and the goodbye.

I actually think this is the moment Dean's mental health sails right off a cliff. Of course it's going wrong. Of course good things don't happen to them. Of course.

[slashtakemylife]

Voltron x ATLA x LOK fusion

A prompt or idea of sorts of the Voltron characters that follows a bit on the ATLA and LOK storylines with little changes, I also added a bit of Voltron’s lore into it

It’s a bit long and I in fact cover 3 arcs from beggining to finish but there are some blank spots which is why it won’t be made into a full fic but I hope you enjoy the ride

Allura, an airbender and the Avatar finds herself in the last and most prominent of the Air Temples being decimated by the Fire Nation, in order to protect her from the Fire Lord’s rage, her father, knocks her out and send her with Coran and her bison away, they catch a storm and when they go down the water she freezes them

- time skip of only a few years - (10?)

Keith, is a firebender from Republic City looking for his missing brother Shiro, his last clue sent him to the South Pole were a stranded Fire Nation boat may have more information on his wereabouts, he sees a south pole-ner? looking at his reflexion on an ice, he tries to bypass him but Lance, a waterbender from the South Tribe spots him, he then wants to capture Keith, who he thinks is a Fire Nation soldier, to impress the ladies and fellas at home however Keith gets the upper hand and easily defeats him, leaving him on the floor covered in snow, Lance in a tantrum brings forth a giant ice that has Allura and Coran along with their bison, named something that I would love if it sounds similar to the Castle of Lions (Cas? just straigth out Castle?)

Allura doesn’t trust Keith because he is fire nation, Keith doesn’t give af and leaves them to reach that ship and they separate, Allura goes with Lance, however Lotor, the exiled prince shows up, Allura can easily beat Lotor but he sends his soldiers to attack the village.

After Keith finds what he needed in the ship, he knows Lotor is attacking them due to the smoke of his ship so he goes to help, that is how he gains Allura’s trust, Keith tells them he is looking for Shiro, he is an important metalbender that has helped keep Republic City safe, however he was sent to Ba Sing Se to help protect it with a few of their squad, they succeed but he ends up captured, there are rumors on him being alive but no one can do anything, thus Keith leaving, he knows he is close

Allura, Coran, Lance and Keith go save Shiro from an ice prision, (long haired Shiro), he has no arm but when he finds metal he uses his bending to create one, while his metal arm works as a natural hand, he still needs some adjustment time to get used and learn how to bend with just one arm, he tells them their most important task is to protect and train the Avatar, Republic City is the most advanced, heavily protected city and is filled with masters that would gladly teach the avatar, btw Allura can’t reach the pasts Avatars and her Avatar state is either weaken or she just can’t reach it, they think it’s a spiritual thing, remember this detail ;)

And then this is the reason this is just like a prompt because basically the next part is just Lotor giving chase and shenanigams happen, in the middle they find Hunk, an earthbender who’s village has been taken by the FN and took his father, they liberate them all and he joins them in their quest, they go to an air temple were a group of non benders has taken over the temple, they were seeking refuge from the fire nation and found the temple, they are tech junkies, once the FN took notice there was someone in the temple they attacked, their inventions helped protect them but with little resources they knew a second wave would decimate them, Sam agreed to be taken away so long as the temple was spared, his son was also taken away as guarantee, Katie Holt just knows his father and brother mysteriously disappeared, leaving Colleen in charge, she escapes as goes by the name of Pidge to avoid being discovered and joins the team

So they reach Republic City (I have to say it’s mostly Adashi but there is story, bare with me please) were Shiro (obviously) reunites with his husband Adam and gives them a place to stay in their home, he wants to announce Allura as the Avatar and begin her training, Adam tells him not to, apparently there is a new issue

Sendak, the equalist, they say he can take bending away and has been kidnapping benders and striping them of their bending to create a benderless world, the kidnappers are expert at close combat that use chi blocking and electricity to kidnap them, this makes Shiro nervous, so they wait out

Next day finds Adam not going to work, Shiro asks if it’s okay given the situation and Adam says he is just a worried husband caring for his recently appeared husband

The truth is the next, Adam is the highest ranking non-bender in the police force, they obviously prefer benders and of course there is the police force of only metal benders, Shiro is a high rank officer (even Chief maybe?) before he was deployed to aid Ba Sing Se from an incoming attack, Adam had a hard time proving himself as a non bender in the police force, the way he reached the top was with his amazing fighting skills and chi blocking, he uses the later to handle benders, so many people in the police force were wary of him, everything Adam fought for, all the time he took to convince the benders he was equal to them, died in 5 seconds when this radical dude showed up (ADASHI TIME! Can I interest you with in-training yet prodigy metal bender Shiro crushing hard on also in-training Adam as he decimates his 5th bender opponent with his bare non-bending hands?)

While they had yet to investigate him fully, he feels uncomfortable since everyone is suspicious of him, some think he is their true leader. So Adam is using Shiro as an excuse to ask for an early vacations to take care of him and also, Adam does want to take care of Shiro, come on! He hasn’t seen Shiro since his deployment nearly four years ago and after he was announced as missing in action, his little brother who lives with them, just dissapears as well so yeah, Adam is not letting his boys out of his watch Ever Again

Again there’s a reason this is a prompt or I don’t know but smth smth happens, Allura is discovered to be the Avatar, they find Sam, he knows part of Honerva’s plan I’ll cover in a few, smth smth, time skip XD then Adam is having an interview done, since he is the highest rank non-bender they want an interview regarding the recent equalizer events, in reality they just give an introduction on who Adam is, the interviewer does the “what you think” question and goes to commercial

There in the radio booth is Sendak and he wants Adam to support the movement since he is one of the most prominent non-benders there is, transmission comes back and instead of a pro-equalists speech, Adam makes a pro-benders one (even mentioning how the love of his life it’s a bender for extra tears)

So anyway, Shiro realizes it’s a trap and he desperately tries to reach Adam but unfortunately Adam gets kidnapped because he refused to bow down to the equalists

In reality, Sendak takes them to Haggar, she is in Republic City because it has the biggest concentration of benders and the most powerful as well as diversity, so the bending is just her taking out their spirit energy/quintessence, leaving them benderless, she trained Sendak to be a blood bender in order to temporarily chi block their bending and make them faint enough for her to act

They go to save Adam but in there, Shiro finds Adam, he is brainwashed and tells him he should allow Haggar to take his bending away so they could have a happy benderless life, away from the battlefield like Adam always wanted, Shiro is one of the strongest benders there is so they do use Adam as bait for him, he has no choice but to shock Adam unconscious, still he losses his bending before Allura can get there, Haggar with so much spiritual/quintessence energy from taking the benders and now one of the strongest, Shiro, goes against Team Avatar until only Allura is left and she also sees she can energy bend even if it’s a little so she is able to defeat her but she escapes, she restores Shiro’s bending as well, btw Lotor also reached Republic city and gets a redemption ark, he changes like Zuko in Ba Sing Se and goes to Team Avatar to reveal that Haggar wants to release Vatu and make Zarkon a dark Avatar

The third ark is they discover the story behind it all, so here it is:

We go back to the paladins of old, GoodZarkon is the Avatar, great friends with the previous Paladins of Voltron, a group of representatives of each nation that helps the avatar with it’s affairs, they had the issue of Vatu being released, you know the 10,000 y/o, it was with them that happened so they make plans to imprison him again

However GoodZarkon’s wife, Honerva believes she can put an end to this cycle because every 10k years each avatar has to deal with him, you just need one avatar to fail for everything to be over, she has been studying spiritual leaves and vines from the spirit world and finds their energy source, which she names quintessence, we all have it, in fact that is what allows benders to bend but spirits can use quintessence at will for so much more, she actually wants to release Vatu and make something with him, not imprison him

Vatu could have tricker her into thinking this would put and end to the squabble, of course they all disagree but shit happens and Honerva is badly injured, maybe a spirit passes through her and she get’s weird? Vatu tells GoodZarkon that with the combined power of him and Raava inside him, they can heal Honerva, so he releases him and tries to contain both entities inside, but only works for them to fight inside GoodZarkon, Vatu just wants to have his cycle like Raava and have her be locked away, the paladins come over and manage to separate both entities out of GoodZarkon, they imprison Vatu and release Raava for her to look for an Avatar, since it was Alfor the one who physically releases her to the world, unbestknown to him, it makes Raava latch onto his energy signature and thus falls into a days old Allura

Leaving GoodZarkon “dead” and out of the cycle but actually he and Honerva both survive as Zarkon and Haggar, since Zarkon had Vatu inside him and Honerva is now kind of spirit crazy Haggar, few years later they kidnapp the current Fire Lord and go to the spirit world were they find the face swapping spirit and they exchange the face to that of the current Fire Lord into Zarkon so he becomes Fire Lord

Zarkon slowly begins his quest of conquering the world but really he is looking for the Avatar because he wants to be the Avatar again, he wants to drag Raava out of Allura and into him again or, release Vatu and take him instead, Haggar is in charge on finding where he is and how to release him, the old paladins sealed the entrance

There was peace in between the old Paladins fight with Zarkon and his supposed ‘death’ were Allura grew but one day the Fire Nation went crazy (they face swap, it’s Zarkon now) and started to want to conquer the world, they were able to keep him contained but they struggle and Zarkon is incredibly powerful due to having previously had both entities inside his body, he retains his core element bending which is fire, and lays waste on the air nation, the paladins join once again to defeat him but without the avatar they can’t do a thing, Alfor knows Allura (now grown up) is the avatar but he considers she’s still to young, Allura wants to fight, wants to fulfill her destiny but one day Zarkon finally lays waste on the final air temple, Alfor sends her and Coran away

Back to the present, The Paladins knew the Fire Lord was previous Avatar Zarkon but said nothing to no one, they just said he died while saving the world from Vatu, that is the reason Allura can’t reach the previous Avatar since the link is broken since Zarkon is not really dead but he’s no longer the Avatar? She finally strips away any connection and finally can connect to previous Avatar and reach the Avatar state at it’s full potential

Big fight, they win, end

[abovethesmokestacks]

Haunted

Title: Haunted Pairing: Bucky x reader Word count: 3.8k Spoilers: general spoilers for CA: CW Warnings: none

This is my contribution to the Halloween Writing Challenge hosted by @rotisserierogers. My prompt was “I know you, don’t I?”, and well… this is what became of it.

Do not repost my fics.

1996

There are few things as intoxicating to a ten-year-old as freedom. Or, okay, maybe a few things. But this came a close second. Or third. The point is, in your ten-year-old eyes, finally getting to go trick-or-treating without a chaperone was as close to true freedom as you could get. You’d wished for this for two years, even feeling a bit ashamed last year when you were among the few to still walk the neighbourhood accompanied by an adult. Sure, it was your older sister (and she suffered just as much, or even more if her whining was to be believed), but still. It was embarrassing.

You and your friends had planned your outfits for weeks, counted your allowances and finally gone down to the masquerade section of the supermarket, clutching your chosen costumes while your mothers shook their heads with amused smiles. Your own mother had glued sequins with such precision, you almost felt guilty about it. They were gonna come off, sooner or later, and you wouldn’t even need a tornado.

“How much did you get?”

“We should go home and change and then run back to mrs. Applebaum’s for more!”

“Trick or treat!”

The neighbourhood is teeming with kids in costumes, greedily looking into their pumpkins and cauldrons, assessing the candy they have been given. You and your friends have finished your round, your basket laden with goodies. As predicted, your shoes look a little worse for wear, apparently glue is no match for your heel clicking abilities.

“See you tomorrow?” your friends ask as you turn onto the street that will lead you home.

“If I don’t die from eating all of this!” you titter, swinging your basket and making the wrapped candy rustle.

Waving goodbye, you hurry down the street. The weather has quickly turned cold, fog billowing in from the sparse forest beyond the houses, and stubborn as you are, you’d refused the poofy jacket your mother had insisted on. Either way, home isn’t far away. The street you walk down turns off into a cul-de-sac a little ways ahead, and at the end of that cul-de-sac is your home. The street is eerily empty, not a trick-or-treater in sight. The cold creeping up your legs has shivers running up your spine, your steps quickening. You’ll never admit it, never in your life, but the quiet street with the fog-wrapped houses scares you.

He comes seemingly out of nowhere, a ghost materializing from the misty wisps clinging to the world. If it wasn’t for your shriek, he would probably have marched past you, never even sparing you a glance. Instead, he turns sharply, fixing you with eyes hidden behind pitch black goggles. Your legs won’t carry you, frozen to the ground in flats with poorly glued red sequins on them. Your cheeks that had only seconds before sported a blush brought on by the chill have now been drained of colour.

He is dangerous, that much is clear. Between the unsettling black goggles and the intimidation that oozes from him, he isn’t someone heading for a Halloween party. Letting your gaze skitter down his torso, you spy a knife strapped to his waist, black masses you think are guns. Dangerous. Seconds tick by, you are still alive. With each passing moment, you start thinking maybe you’ll make it home, maybe he won’t hurt you, maybe it’s all just-

“Беги домой, маленькая Дороти.”

His voice is rough, deep, the language sharp and oddly unfitting. When you don’t do anything, your feet still frozen to the ground, he tries motioning away from himself. It doesn’t escape you that he keeps glancing down the street, the set of his jaw like what you’ll see on your father sometimes. Stressed, but it’s laced with something else, something you can’t quite place yet. Rifling through your basket, you close your hand around a familiar shape, the wrapper crackling as you pull it out from the mass of candy.

He hesitates when you hand it to him, perhaps some part of him recognizes the gesture. You’re handing him one of your favourites, all too aware that you only have one other left. If you’re gonna get away alive, you might as well thank him. Like the people who paid the ferryman in the story from your favourite book. When he finally makes up his mind, his hand shoots out to snatch the candy from you, circling it between his fingers. The mask comes off, and somehow you expected there to be… more beneath it. A monster, something grotesque. Not this, not someone who looks so… ordinary. His teeth glint in the low light as he tears the wrapper, pulling the candy from it.

“Спасибо, маленькая,” he grinds out between chews, reaching out to gently push you away, pointing down the street. “Беги, пожалуйста.”

When you still don’t move, he moves to lunge at you, the movement meant to scare you. It unfreezes you, your yelp shrill in the quiet night, and you run without looking back, clutching your basket to you. Your mother says you look like you’ve seen a ghost when you stumble through the front door, tuts and chuckles when you nod mutely. He was a ghost, you tell yourself that night when you go to bed. Part of you reasons that he wasn’t real, he can’t get to you. Part of you fears he will haunt you.

Isn’t that what ghosts do?

He never comes for you. Despite the vigil you keep for the days following Halloween, you never see him again. Nothing strange happens. Your friend gets a new cat. There’s a funeral for someone one street over, your sister kisses a boy and gets mono. No ghost turns up at your window, nor anyone else’s window. Not that you actually ask, but if a strange man turned up at your window, people would know. Especially if it’s the ghost.

2014

Time passes. Days, weeks. Time flies. Months. Years. With each passing measure of time, you lose him more and more. One Halloween in college, you find yourself doing a double take when someone enters the party dressed in black. It’s some video game character, but from the corner of your eye, it could be him. You try to remember, and the vision of him is still as clear as the night you saw him, but his voice is lost. The words he spoke, foreign to your ears then, have dissolved into a muddle, distorted and weakened.

Years later you wake from a dream of sparkly shoes and a shapeless shadow, its edges flimsy as it reaches for you. Your thundering heartbeat as you jolt awake screams that you dodged some incomprehensible danger, but your mind persists that it is something familiar. There was that… man? No, a ghost? There was something that one Halloween. The image is vague, the sensation of fingers crinkling around candy wrapper and a firm push on your shoulders.

No matter, it’s been years. You’re living in the present, and the present tells you to go back to sleep because work is sure to be hell tomorrow. Never a boring day at SHIELD.

And then Captain Rogers defects.

And then the Triskellion falls.

And then you see him.

He’s all over the news, the internet, and just like that he materializes in your mind just as he was then. Black clothes, the mask, the weapons. You finally see his eyes, cold and determined, and something in you reacts violently, refuses to accept. Swallowing it down, you force yourself to think logically. It’s a memory, tainted by nostalgia, by your own insufficiency. It’s him, all of him.

But just like Halloween, he manages to slip away. One moment he is everywhere, the next there is not a peep to be heard. You scour the internet, tries to dig through the mass of files released by agent Romanov. Your world shrinks, the walls seemingly closing in as you realize the place you worked at was a front for something far more sinister. Some of the files make you sick. Some make you cry. You try cross referencing and searching for anything you could come up with. Halloween 1996. Russian attacker. It yields nothing conclusive. Russian soldier yields a few vague references to a HYDRA program, taken over by the Russians. One file is all text in Russian cyrillic, and you know Google translate enough that you won’t gain much by trying to run the entire file. You copy the title instead, pasting it into the translator.

ПРОЕКТ ЗИМНИЙ СОЛДАТ

PROJECT WINTER SOLDIER

Using that as your search term yields much of the same results, all vague, all text, all ominous in their content. It’s gonna take another two years before the name truly means something to you, to the world. For now, you ghost remains a ghost.

Present day

What remains of the Avengers, of SHIELD, has been salvaged as best anyone has managed to. It’s in shambles, but it’s something. A tentative truce has been called between the factions, lines of communication established and dutifully used as signs of good faith. You’re called back, vetted and confirmed, an… intermediary of sorts. It’s absurd, having to play go-between, but you’re happy to do it. A lot of people moved on after D.C, you almost missed your shot, but a missed bus gave you the opportunity to step up to the plate again.

A lot of your work is making arrangements. Captain Rogers and his team are still keeping their base of operations in Wakanda, and you have finally reached a stage where the plane you’re on now is headed for the wealthy nation. Stark insisted on a jet, horrified at the thought of sending you a) on a commercial flight, and b) flying coach. That alone had taken a good deal of negotiating, and for you to overcome your fear of flying.

It’s not the flying that’s got your stomach in knots now, though. It’s seeing him again. For all the mess caused in Vienna and Leipzig, it gave you a name. Bucky Barnes. The internet was full of information, part of the Captain America-exhibition at the Smithsonian dedicated to him. For decades, Sergeant James Barnes had been kept and brainwashed by HYDRA. He was your ghost, the stranger from Halloween. Captain Rogers has been loath to mention anything about Sergeant Barnes. Thoughts swirl through your head as you clutch the armrests of the leather seat, knuckles paling by the second. It’s preposterous to think he’d remember you, right? You were a kid, he was brainwashed.

Stepping off the jet in Wakanda, the heat and humidity hit you like a wall after the air conditioned flight, your skin flushing before you’ve descended the stairs. The perk of flying Stark and being received by the king of Wakanda is that you don’t have to suffer for long. In time, there will be opportunity to acclimatise, to enjoy the balmy weather. For now, a sleek town car waits, and beyond that, a meeting you have feared and expected for months.

Maybe you’re a little disappointed that there’s no sign of him when you’re brought into a conference room. The smile you give Captain Rogers is hopefully convincing enough to hide your disappointment that he and Sam Wilson, along with king T’Challa and a few guards from the Dora Milaje are the only ones present. The disappointment will just have to wait to be felt.

The king is a generous man, offering you a grand bedroom in the private section of the royal residence. You’re not due to return to New York until the day after tomorrow, and the king had graciously offered to host you while you were there. His insistence when you said you would be happy to book a hotel had rivalled that of Tony’s.

The night is humid, but mercifully cooler, a soft fog rolling in from the mountains and wrapping around the large statues situated in front of the palace. It set a chill travelling up your spine as you rifle through your luggage for something to wear. The business-like outfit lies discarded on the floor, and even though you are bone-tired, something pulls at you. Maybe it’s the fog. Maybe it’s knowing he’s here.

And maybe you pick the blue dress on purpose, takimg extra care to part your hair and make two neat braids.

If someone asks, you’re only heading to the communal kitchen for something to drink. Your footfall, though muted by the slippers on your feet, make a dull echo as you ghost down the corridors. It’s beauty beyond anything you could have dreamed of, an understated pride and majesty emanating from the rooms. You see no one, but you don’t doubt someone knows exactly where you are.

The kitchen is empty, dimly lit and open in its design. Quickly, you make a beeline for the row of fridges, opening one after the other and revelling in the cool air until you find one stocked with water bottles. Picking out two, you close the door, only to walk into what feels like a wall.

“Sorry- God, I- Are you all right?” A hand grabs you to steady you, the grip gentle and warm.

You don’t need to look up to know who you’ll see. In fact, you fight the urge to do just that, knowing that if you do, there’s no telling what will trip across your lips.

“I haven’t seen you before. Did… Are you the, uh, envoy from Stark?”

You can’t help but snort, your eyes flitting up to meet the crystalline eyes trained on you. “That sure beats go-between.”

There’s a smile teasing at the corners of his mouth, a little spark in his gaze that flicker out when his eyebrows knit together. His head cocks to one side, taking a step back to look at you. It gives you the chance to look at him, really look at him, for the first time since that Halloween. He seems… bigger. Shouldn’t he look smaller, the memories of your childhood surely having exaggerated his size.

“I’m Bucky, and…” He reaches out, his right hand coming up to twirl one of your braids around his index finger. “I… I know you, don’t I?”

I know you, don’t I?

Movement is restricted. Words well up only to die in your throat. You barely manage the small nod in confirmation, your gaze fixed on him as he tries to figure out why he knows you. Bucky lets go of your braid, his eyes drifting close, lips moving, seemingly repeating something.

“Беги домой… Беги домой…”

Bucky snaps his eyes open, lips frozen slightly parted, taking another step backwards. It almost looks like he might run, but he forces himself to approach you again, fingers trembling as they reach out to pull both braids to rest against your chest.

“You… Dorothy. You were smaller.” When you nod, he cracks into a smile that is laced with so much relief you would think his entire existence has hinged on this detail.

“You gave me candy. I don’t think- It felt like it was the first time I tasted anything that sweet. It was the first thing I ever bought myself after…” He falls quiet, but you can see where his thoughts are heading. After D.C. After the helicarriers. After the fall of SHIELD.

“I got out before the building came down,” you offer, shifting the bottles you’re holding,the condensation starting to seep through the material of your dress. “And I’m not HYDRA. I doubt anyone has been vetted more thoroughly than the few of us who came back after the Accords backfired. I’m pretty sure all the Avengers know the exact balance of my bank account and what my favourite ice cream flavour is.”

Bucky nods, quiet and polite, but you can imagine he’s not going to take your word for it. You probably wouldn’t either. It’s a bizarre situation, and you wouldn’t fault him for seeing more than coincidences in the way your life has played out.

“I thought you were a ghost, you know.” You smirk at the idea you carried with you for so many years, childishly silly now that you stand before him. “You were the strangest thing I’d ever seen, and I saw you on Halloween.”

“That was the point,” Bucky mumbles, looking down at the fingers of his metal arm, no doubt restored by king T’Challa’s skilled scientists and engineers, as they whir ever so softly before closing to a fist. “A ghost has no body, no life, no meaning beyond haunting.”

“Hey…”

“It’s fitting. Restless spirit, killing people. Just… passing through and never staying, never living.”

You want to reach out for him, but even if he is in control, you still have a healthy respect for the material of his clenched fist. “You didn’t kill me. I saw you, right? Would have been so easy to kill me, dispose of a witness.”

Bucky looks up again, brow furrowed. “You… You were a kid.”

“I saw you. You talked to me.”

“Told you to go home.”

“Exactly. I’m still here, aren’t I? And so are you. You’re not a ghost, Bucky. I walked into you, didn’t pass through you.”

It’s not like you expect to be able to solve his moral torment. You wouldn’t even know where to begin. Bucky doesn’t seem like he’s overly keen on discussing it either, whether it’s because of you or the time or both. His lips are pressed together, the metal hand still a tight fist by his side.

“I should let you… I should go back to bed,” you flounder, giving a weak smile.

Bucky hums, avoiding your gaze and stepping aside to let you exit the kitchen. Walking past him draws the urge to touch him, to comfort him to the surface again, but you don’t want to be too forward. You barely know each other. You were a kid, he was brainwashed, you gave him candy, and he-

You stop, turning around. “The candy. It was the first thing you bought after D.C?”

Bucky inhales sharply, pulled from his thoughts. “Hmm?”

“You said it felt like you’d never tasted anything as sweet and that it was the first thing you bought.”

A smile flickers across his face. “Sort of. Left the US pretty much immediately after D.C. First time I ever had money to buy myself food, I almost fainted in the candy aisle. This vivid memory of sweet and sugary pushed through. Probably looked like an idiot, buying one of each kind of candy bar, trying to find the one you gave me.”

“It was my favourite,” you remark, “still is.”

“Never found it. Got a couple that came close, but never exactly like that.” He shrugs his shoulders, relaxing his fist and shoving his hands into the pockets of his sweats. “Started thinking it was just something my mind exaggerated because of the circumstances.”

“It’s not, I can tell you that.” Your heart jumps when you catch the faint chuckle. “Okay, well… I should… go.”

“Goodnight, Dorothy.”

“Goodnight, Tin Man.”

—

He doesn’t see her for the rest of her stay, but he can tell when she’s left. Knowing now that she was real, not just a figment of his scrambled mind, her presence in the palace had set off something like a proximity radar. He respectfully kept his distance, avoided any more nightly excursions, but just knowing that she was there, real and alive after everything, had him buzzing. It vanished the second she left to fly back, finding out from overhearing a conversation between two guards. Asking Steve was out of the question.

It’s not that he doubts himself and his memory when she’s gone. Or maybe just a little. So much in there is twisted, blurred or simply existing as a carved out space he’ll never be able to fill.

Time is still strange. Some days he wakes up, unsure of the date, his view offering no clear indicators as to whether it’s spring or fall. His hand will shoot out, rifle for his phone, pressing the home button to make the screen light up with today’s time and date.

It says October now, and his body tells him it should be squirming, fighting a chill that now more than ever has him itching and crawling in his own skin. His body still remembers the cold Brooklyn winters, just as it remembers the cruel bite of cryo before his mind went black. He hasn’t felt that in months now, always waking up to a perfectly temperate room, silky sheets soft and cool underneath him and a gentle breeze weaving in past the thin curtains of his balcony. The part of him that despises the cold appreciates it, relaxes to find himself back in what has become his new normal.

Two polite knocks on the door draws his attention. Though the force behind them has changed, but Bucky lived with Steve long enough to recognize the man’s knocks. Clearing his throat, his calls out for his friend to enter, picking his sweats off the floor and pulling them on.

“Something in the mail for you. Told them I’d take it to you,” Steve tells him by way of greeting, holding up a bulky-looking package.

Apprehension shoots through Bucky’s body, tenses muscles, pulls his face into an expression that could never be mistaken as anything but suspicion. No one outside the Avengers knows he is here. None of the Avengers would send him anything.

“Hey, Buck… Buck, relax. It’s okay, it’s been scanned, it’s harmless, I promise. Nothing sinister.”

“Who is it from?” he bites out, still standing with his legs apart, ready to jump back if necessary.

“Why don’t you open it and find out?” Steve smirks, setting the package down on the small table by the door, turning on his heel to leave.

Alone again, Bucky approaches the package with suspicion. It���s been scanned, he repeats. Not a threat. Just a package. Poking it reveals it to be… pliable. Made of something rustling. Plastic? Apprehension gives way to curiosity, and he pushes the index finger of his left hand under the sealed flap, pulling to make the paper and bubble wrap underneath give way and tipping it to let the content fall into his hand.

It’s… The laughter bubbles up and out of him, blooming through his chest as letters in vivid colours proclaims it to be a family sized bag of a wrapped candy his mind remembers. Taped to it is a scrap of paper, the script hurried, ink having bled a little in a few places. Bucky tears open the bag, plucking out a piece and shedding the wrapping, biting into it while smiling down at the note.

Consider this your clock, Tin Man. Happy Halloween.

- Dorothy

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