They are still rebuilding, still too young to bear so many scars. There come days, even now, when it takes strength they can’t muster to crawl out of bed, when one of them drifts, listless and exhausted — jaded by seventy missing years of age, and by the twisting, unfolding gap between what they used to be and everything they have become. They don’t count it, don’t display it on their skin, but the time wears and tears at their bones, not theirs to claim and theirs nonetheless. They are, as it is: thirty-three and thirty-two and ninety-nine and ninety-eight, give or take a few years that have slipped through the cracks. Mostly, they’ve stopped counting; age doesn’t take a discernible toll on the serum, which allows for public indifference towards their altered physicality. At first glance, most people can’t identify a noteworthy change between 1940s Steve and 21st Century Steve. As for Bucky — these days, no one looks at him for long enough to try. Those who do didn’t grow up with time-honoured tales of war hero Sergeant Barnes; in that, the lack of peering eyes and perpetual praise, he finds a flooding, guilty reprieve. Whatever he is, it’s not a hero.
The understanding roots itself deep inside his chest early on, fits like a puzzle piece alongside everything else articles and archives can’t explain away. He’s traipsed through the Smithsonian like a ghost and buried himself in frayed copies of history books that fabricate valiant war anecdotes to disguise the scent of blood and worn holes through tattered photos of a memory that sits right on the tip of his tongue. Bucky knows fracturing deceit like he knows ceaselessly humming songs from the radio under his breath, digging aggravated fingernails into the soft flesh of his palm, loving Steve and suppressing it.
That is a story no history book can recount.
And — that is the crux of the matter. This is Bucky at his core, the person underneath who no terror or trauma could shatter beyond repair, but every record bleeds false authenticity and disregards the torturous suffering and tremendous loss out of hand. Even where his time served as the Winter Soldier is written out of the narrative, he can’t wipe the red off of his hands or hide behind meticulously-crafted memoirs because shedding his skin and his sins wouldn’t rid him of the things he’s seen. He was a sniper-trained sergeant before he was ever forced into a seventy-year battle against his will; seeing Captain America and his Howling Commandos over-glorified and propagandized makes him nauseous. Warfare, bloodshed, agony, and then the thrashing, aching gravity that still sits sick and somber in their stomachs — he never wants to see it celebrated again.
To Bucky’s dismay, the media acts with a vigor that cannot be contained, and it is his own face greeting him in the museums and history books and photographs, someone distant from his past that he is only just beginning to reconcile with. Relearning is a process, the Wakandan doctors had prompted, and understanding who you are again will take time, and like puzzle pieces, there are still parts of him that don’t fit right. He is healing, and where it’s important, where Steve is concerned, his confidence in his own mind doesn’t waver. Twelve and eighty-something years of friendship, by any count; if fate or coincidence can’t sever their bond despite attempts time and time again, Bucky doubts it’s fading memory loss that will ultimately do the trick. Knowing who Bucky Barnes is, though, amidst the gallery of people the world makes him out to be… some days, the gap that lies between the person he’s become and the one everyone else finds in him feels impossibly, unequivocally vast.
Recovery isn’t painless, and he still hasn’t quite learned to live with himself, but it’s recovery nonetheless. His scars don’t taunt him like they used to; his nightmares, albeit sporadic, are growing infrequent. In part, he thinks it has to be something about the air in Wakanda, balmy and deliciously fresh. It brings him a peace and revitalization that he hasn’t known in what sometimes feels like a thousand years.
“Remember that time I made you ride The Cyclone?” “And I threw up?” “This isn’t payback, is it?” How many times do you think Steve replayed that conversation in his head after watching Bucky fall?
All the time. Thinking about everything he could have done differently. He shouldn't have distracted him. He should have talked about something else. Who talks about vomiting at a time like this? He should have said something important. He should have told him he loved him. He should have told him to stay. He should have…
Okay, this is stupid, but I noticed one thing recently and my brain is screaming "It's destiny!"
But what exactly?
Our little darling pre-serum!Steve weighed 43 kg at 162.8 cm tall (I'm using centimeters because I don't understand the american metric system, okay?). However, after taking the serum his weight jumped to almost 109 kg at 188.2 cm tall. This information is easy to spot in the museum scenes in CA:WS, so it's not really a big deal, is it?
BUT
Not everyone notices that information about Bucky's height and weight also appeared in CA:WS. (Bucky, not Sebastian, because for some reason it's different.)
When found by the Soviets Bucky weighed 70.3 kg and was 175.2 cm tall.
But why am I talking about this?
WAIT
Rounding numbers:
175 - 162 = 13
188 - 175 = 13
The canonical height difference between Steve and Bucky was kept, just reversed.