#its through the app | Explore Tumblr posts and blogs

greyskyflowers · 17 days ago

Text

There's just so many interesting ways to explore Bucky relearning how to be a person again because it would/should have been a process.

Losing parts of yourself is such an easy thing to do.

Someone says you're stupid enough times, and then you start to wonder if you are.

Someone comments on the size of your nose enough, and then you start to think it's big.

Someone treats you like you're worthless, and then you start to think you are.

They wouldn't have treated him like a human. They wouldn't even need to break him, just treat him like a thing, and eventually, he'll start to wonder if he is.

They don't talk or listen to him because things can't talk. They ignore his questions and begging. They ignore his cries and screams.

Is he even making them? Can they hear him.

They don't worry if he bleeds. Things don't bleed.

Is he even bleeding anymore? Is it just in his head?

They don't call him by his name. Things don't have names.

What was his name again?

They don't feed him real food. Things don't get hungry.

He doesn't feel hungry anymore.

They don't have a set schedule for him. Things don't care about the passage of time.

What day is it? How long as he been here?

They don't care if he hurts. Things can't hurt.

Maybe he doesn't hurt? Maybe this is normal and he's just confused. He's always confused now.

They say maintenance and maintain and fix.

You don't do those things to people. So he's not a person, right? He can't be if that's what they're doing to him.

People have names.

Right? Did it ever have one? Even if it did, who would have used it?

No, it never had a human name. It was created, crafted.

No one worries if their gun is hungry, or if their knife is trying to communicate with them, or if their tool is tired.

Those things are not for it.

And then you've got this guy, out of nowhere, who knows you.

Who says a name and is looking at you while he says it.

He's talking to you like you can speak back, like he wants you to speak back.

And it's confusing, so confusing, because why does the man think it is a person?

It gets more confused after a few days on its own because why is it suddenly needing human maintenance?

Its stomach aches, and it knows the ache is hunger. Why does it know that?

The man finds it.

It is a relief in a way. It requires attention and repairs.

It tells the man that it is malfunctioning.

The man says that he is hurt

...but things don't hurt. It needs repair.

Healing the man says.

Things don't heal though.

It starts to shut off more.

Sleeping the man says. You need to sleep.

The bed is for people. It sleeps in the ice. If it must rest, then it rests on the floor.

The man is quiet angry and he takes a long walk.

The man is not Hydra. He gets angry when it asks about previous handlers.

It requires a handler, though, an owner. Things are not free.

So, the man must be its handler, even if he is not Hydra.

Things must be maintained, and to be maintained, they must belong to someone.

The man calls him Bucky, always says Bucky when it calls itself it.

Fine. It will answer to the name Bucky if the man requests so.

Things don't have names, and things don't want them, but Bucky is a nice name if it must have one.

The man makes it do human things.

It must eat and drink. They start small because if it eats certain things, then it malfunctions, and the man gets upset.

It must sleep, or try to, each night. There is no ice, just blankets. It is given several of them since it maintains that it must sleep on the floor. It doesn't know what to do with them. The man eventually lays them out in a way that he deems comfortable.

The blankets are... nice. Warm.

It did not know it was cold.

The man speaks to it and listens. It doesn't know what to say, it has never been given attention like this.

The man introduces other people, and it makes sure to remember them because these people seem important to the man.

Sam.

Natasha.

Tony.

And it must remember the man is called Steve.

Tony is odd.

Tony does not like it. That is fine. Things don't care if they are liked or not.

Steve and Tony argue about it on the other side of the room, but it acts like it does not hear them.

Tony wants to see all its information.

It had not knows Steve had all of its protocols and maintenance information.

Steve agrees and Tony leaves.

Tony comes back after a few days. The anger is still on him, but it's different. He looks at its arm and says it needs maintenance.

Finally.

Tony will be able to help Steve understand that it does not require human maintenance.

Tony does not tell Steve this.

He looks at it for awhile when it asks if he will help Steve understand that it is not a person.

Things don't ask questions. It should not have spoken. It is malfunctioning.

Tony goes back to the arm without answering, and that's fine. People don't talk to things. They talk at them.

Steve's human maintenance has caused it to start malfunctioning.

Tony calls it Bucky, too.

They're both terrible at this.

It keeps malfunctioning.

It keeps asking questions. Why? It can't stop itself.

It likes the blankets.

It doesn't know if it has liked things before. The blankets are soft and warm, and it likes to touch them.

It does not like cold now that it knows that it is always cold.

Steve brings it blankets often after he realizes how much it likes them.

These people touch it a lot.

Tony touches it while he does maintenance. This maintenance does not hurt, and the arm doesn't hurt malfunction as often.

Tony plays music and talks a lot. He has little robots that are strange and clearly malfunctioning, but he does not take corrective steps. Instead, he allows the malfunctions, maybe even seems to enjoy them.

Maybe it likes this... maintenance... like it likes the blanket.

The woman Natasha, that's not her name... is it? touches it. She does maintenance braids she calls them on its hair. She is confident when she touches it, but she also makes her movements clear.

Why does she do that for it? Things don't need to know what someone will do to it. It is... nice. It thinks it likes this too.

Sam touches it. He talks to it a lot, too. He is purposeful but makes sure to touch it each time he comes to visit.

He wants it to speak back. He encourages it to speak more than he wants to speak himself. He is patient, even when it is not able to make the words come out right.

It likes this... having someone listen.

They bring more people.

A man, Clint, with sharp eyes who jokes with it, tries to make it laugh.

Clint is a marksman and very skilled. He takes it with him when he goes to train. He insists they have competitions and there are no punishments when it does not perform to or exceed expectations.

Sometimes, he brings small pieces of candy for them to share, and he winks like it's a secret just between them.

Things don't smile... but it feels like something inside of it is smiling.

There's another man, Bruce, quiet and careful. Something about him gives an air of power, but he is gentle. A scientist, more than Tony, and he makes it... nervous? No, not nervous. Things don't get nervous.

The man looks over it like it is human, asking it if anything hurts like it is a person.

It tells him where it is damaged, even though it is fully operational.

If it is fully operational, then the damage does not require maintenance. It did not need to tell him. Things don't hurt.... why did it tell him where it hurt?

Thor is loud and big. He smells like rain, and it likes that. It did not know it liked the smell of rain.

Thor is not scared of it. He does not worry about a malfunction, and he seems to have no expectations on it or what it might have been.

He does not lower his voice around it, and he even does a sort of roughhousing with it at times, although Steve hovers nervously whenever that happens. He claps it on the back and calls it friend like Steve does, and is it suppose to know this man too? It doesn't remember this man.

Things don't have memories, but... sometimes, it thinks it might.

It asks Steve about them sometimes, slow and quiet, because while Steve has not hurt it for remembering or asking questions, it knows remembering was bad.

Remembering means pain. Why does it know that?

Steve tells it about them. He says it had a family, sisters, and friends. He talks about them, and about the war and the howling commandos, and... oh, it is crying.

Things do not cry. It is malfunctioning.

They all call it Bucky.

They give it maintenance like it is a person.

They like when it likes things and even look happy when it decides that it does not like things.

They do not treat it as a thing... so maybe it isn't? Maybe... he's a person.

It refers to itself as he a few days later.

Tentative, and after a pause where it was hard to get the word out, he looks up carefully through his lashes because what if he's wrong? What if this was a test and what if they wanted to get him to think this way just to take it away an-

They are happy.

Steve is very happy and he likes it when Steve is happy.

He likes it when they are all happy.

There are bad days when he does not think he is a person and thinks they're playing a terrible game with him.

They're being cruel. They have to be because he's not a person.

If he's a person, then that means he's been a person this whole time and that Hydra took that away from him.

That means...

He's not there yet. He doesn't like to talk about things like that yet. It makes his head hurt, and he doesn't like that, and it's too much. He gets upset... because he is a person and people get upset.

That is still a strange thought to him, that he's human.

He tells Steve about things he remembers. He has questions, and he's getting better at asking them without tripping over his words or stopping halfway through.

He has a bed with lots of blankets.

He has food and books and music that he likes.

He has a big marker he can write his name on things with. He's still scared all of it is going to be taken away from him, but if his name is Bucky and if he's a person, then his name on things means that those things are his.

Right? He had to ask to make sure, but they all said that was right. He likes putting his name on things.

He likes having things.

He likes to take the drawings Steve makes and always gives to him. He likes that Sam brings him little things whenever he goes somewhere. Sometimes, it's pins, or buttons or pretty pieces of paper.

He likes small screws from Tony's lab, pens Bruce leaves laying around, hair ties from Natasha, pop tart wraps that Thor drops, and the heads of arrows that Clint loses.

He likes that he's remembering more and more. He likes remembering that he's always liked things. Like dancing, and records, and laughing, and Steve.