Life, Death, and the Shield Between (multi chapter, complete)
Eight years after the mission in Afghanistan that earned him three Medals of Honor, John - along with Bucky and Sam - finds himself dragged into a dangerous game of chess against the terrorist that was supposed to be long dead.
The Best Things Take Work (oneshot)
John comes home injured from an operation he was on for Val. Set between Falcon and the Winter Soldier and Thunderbolts.
Not Going Anywhere (oneshot)
John has a habit of jumping between his teammates and dangerous situations
Numb (oneshot)
Upon arriving back stateside after Lemar's death, John is just... numb.
If This Ain’t Heaven Then it’s Pretty Close (set of one shots, in progress)
John says he can’t dance. Four times Olivia proves him wrong.
Protect Each Other (oneshot)
An unexpected trip to the Void lands John and Bob in one of John's worst memory's from Afghanistan.
Lemar Lives AU Series:
(In reading order)
Steady (multi chapter, complete)
John is badly injured in Latvia when Lemar doesn’t make it in time.
On Your Six (multi chapter, complete)
When a military op leads to an escaped HYDRA scientist, the file triggers an alert to contact Captain America. It doesn't matter that the alert's originator meant Rogers. It's been months since John picked up the shield, so he and Lemar head out to help their former Ranger unit capture Dr Ethan Voigt, simultaneously still trying to find their footing in this ever escalating superhero line of work and still make it home for Christmas.
Close Calls (one shot)
While in pursuit of a dangerous villain, John gets gassed with a chemical agent.
Steady Part Two (a Falcon and the Winter Soldier fic)
Read on AO3
Story Summary:
John is badly injured in Latvia when Lemar doesn’t make it in time.
Chapter Summary:
John remembers pieces of what happened with the Flag Smashers while Olivia yells at a set of visitors loud enough to disrupt the whole hospital.
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It had only been a couple of hours after he’d finally made a decision to take the serum that a lead on the Flag Smashers had come through. Only a couple of hours after he’d been curled up on the bathroom floor of a hotel room in Latvia, screaming into a towel to dampen the sound. John had always thought he had a better than average pain tolerance, but it had felt like someone had tried to set him on fire from the inside out. Every vein, every muscle, every inch of him burning.
And then it had stopped, leaving him panting and curled into himself until the phone call had come through. They had a lead on the Flag Smashers. It was time to get to work.
What came next had been a furious blur of action, not unlike many of their operations. But the capture operation quickly turned into a hostage rescue and John didn’t have time to linger on the new strength that showed itself in the way a throw he’d performed dozens of times now buried the shield in the wall or that he could lift a Flag Smasher and throw him down the stairs with ease. Or the fact that Sam Wilson somehow just so happened to stumble into the fight in time to see him do it. John didn’t have time for any of it. That should have come after Lemar was safely out of their hands, and it would have if the Flag Smasher hadn’t caught him by surprise, wrenched his arms behind him, and opened him wide to Morgenthau attack. That’s why there’d been so many knives.
He didn’t remember much else. Just snippets… the sudden pressure against his chest like a man twice his size had balled his fists up and slammed them down, Lemar yelling his name somewhere in the distance, and a coppery taste on his tongue that was never a good sign. He didn’t remember falling and he didn’t know what happened after. Yelling. There’d been yelling. He wasn’t sure who.
And Lemar had demanded that he open his eyes.
It wasn’t the ceiling of the old building in Latvia or even the floor, but instead the bright white fluorescent that - when combined with the obnoxiously sanitized smell - could only belong in a hospital. John blinked hard, trying to clear his vision, and turned his head to look sluggishly around the room. There was a chair on either side of the bed - one with what looked like an old cup of coffee next to it and the other scooted closer to his bed with a blanket draped over the back - and Captain America’s shield in its protective casing leaned up against the far wall. That’s right. He’d survived the knife to the chest. Looked like the cat was out of the bag when it came to the serum earlier than he had anticipated.
John grimaced as he reached a hand up, fingers gently touching the hospital gown over where he could feel the deep wound still healing. He was moving to tug it back to see if he could get a better look when the sound of shouting - more importantly, Olivia shouting - stole his attention. He shoved himself up on his elbows before he’d really thought it through, but his wife’s irate voice from outside the closed hospital door steeled his determination. He focused on keeping his breathing steady as he quickly and efficiently unhooked himself from the monitors, IV, and tugged the tube that had been pushing oxygen into his nose away so that he could swing his bare feet over the side of the bed.
The floor shifted underneath him, or at least that’s what it felt like. John tried to broaden his stance to find more stability, but stumbled back against the bed instead, the jolt to his still-healing body ripping the breath from his lungs. He squeezed his eyes shut as he desperately tried to will himself under control.
“Thirty-six hours,” Lemar’s oddly irritated voice cut through the pain and what must have been the alarms he’d set off when he disconnected all of the monitors. John felt his best friend’s hands on his shoulders to steady him and he managed to pry his eyes open. Oh. He really was upset. That was rare. “You couldn’t even give us forty-eight before you went and did something insane. Dumbest smart man I know,” he groused and it felt like he was trying to guide John back into the hospital bed.
“Liv,” the injured man managed and the frustration instantly drained from Lemar’s face.
“She’s fine. Trying to get arrested by the MPs, but she’s okay.”
Then, suddenly, she was at his side and John breathed a sigh of relief as he caught a whiff of her cinnamon and some-number-of-spices shampoo she used. Her palm pressed against his face and he reached up for her hand, holding on and turning to press a kiss into it. “What happened?”
“Nothing you need to worry about,” she answered, her voice strained and he looked past her to the door.
Sam Wilson hesitated there, looking very much like he wasn’t sure if she’d throw something at his head if he took a step into the room. She probably would, but why, John wasn’t sure. Probably something he should know about.
“I’ll be damned,” Bucky said from behind him, surprise and anger fighting to dominate his expression. “You did take it.”
“If you’re looking for an apology for being alive, you’re not getting one,” John growled at him, hating how raw his throat still felt. He wondered just how the serum worked when it came to healing. Maybe it was taking care of the more life-threatening situations first, leaving the scratchiness from the tube shoved down his throat for last. That didn’t make sense. Maybe it was something else.
A nurse attempted to push past Sam and Bucky as John was trying to ease back into the bed with Lemar’s help. He waved her off. “Give us a minute?”
“Sir --”
John shot Lemar a look and thought for a second he was going to get an argument from him, but his friend set his jaw, swallowed whatever he wanted to say down, and moved towards the nurse, kicking on all the charm required as he scooted her out of the room. Olivia came to stand where he’d been as John carefully eased his legs back onto the bed. Damn. That hurt.
Lemar closed the door and turned glare on the two heroes they’d been trying to get to work with them. John loosed a breath. “Okay. Clearly I missed something while --”
“Bleeding out on the floor?” Lemar offered, but the words were clearly directed at Sam who gave a small frown at them.
The sigh was more pronounced this time. “Listen, I don’t have the energy to play guessing games right now. Someone fill me in on what I missed when I was unconscious.”
“She should probably go,” Bucky said, nodding towards Olivia.
“Like hell,” she snapped, taking a step closer to John’s bedside. Great. Even his civilian wife seemed to know more about what had happened on his own mission than he did. Fantastic.
“Let’s just take it easy here,” Sam offered, looking between both Bucky and Lemar like he thought the two were going to get into a brawl right there in the middle of the medical facilities on Ramstein Air Base. That’s when John started really looking. He saw the cut along Sam’s cheekbone like someone had taken a swing at him and the bandage peeking out from under Lemar’s uniform cuff. Both could have been injuries dealt by the Flag Smashers during the scuffle, but he had the strangest feeling that there was another explanation between the three of them after he’d gone down. It was like a memory that had been washed away, only the last scattered droplets of it remaining.
“John? You good, man?”
Blue eyes blinked hard, the room coming back into focus to find Lemar staring at him and Olivia reaching out for his hand. He drew in a painful breath. “Someone needs to start talking,” he said roughly and turned a sharp look on Bucky. “Let’s start with you.”
“I don’t take orders from you, Walker.”
“Just makes me think you’re the one that started whatever shit went down.”
Bucky nodded towards Lemar. “Ask your buddy there what he did.”
“Lemar’s not exactly known for starting the fight.” He looked at Sam. “You find out the hard way he can finish them?”
“I didn’t touch Hoskins,” Sam growled and John finally turned back to the only person that had been there that he trusted to tell him the truth.
Lemar, the man that had always been willing to try another way right up until the punches started flying, looked ready to get back into it. “If you hadn’t gotten in my way, this would have been done.”
Sam bristled at that. “She was unarmed at that point."
“Bullshit,” Lemar growled, squaring his shoulders. “She’s a super soldier, and she didn’t have her knife because she’d just put it into John’s chest. He’d be dead if he hadn’t taken that stuff.”
“Which is something we need to talk about,” Sam pressed.
“Stop. Stop,” John cut in, wincing as he repositioned himself on the bed and wishing he’d found a conscious moment to put on a pair of sweatpants and t-shirt at minimum. It was bad enough that he couldn’t stay on his feet for more than two seconds, but to be sitting there in his boxers and a hospital gown was humiliating.
Surprisingly, they gave him a moment to catch his breath. When he had it again he looked over at his best friend. “Talk to me.”
The rage that looked so foreign on him finally eased a little at the words. “You were down. I grabbed your gun and was about to take Morgenthau out, but Sam over there wanted to play referee.”
John nodded at his bandaged wrist. “How’d that happen?”
“I took a swing at Sam and Bucky sent me skidding across the floor,” Lemar said tightly, his lips twitching downward. “She got away, they pursued, and medical showed up a few minutes later.” There was a haunted look in his dark eyes as they remained unfocused, his mind likely back where they’d been in that moment.
John ran a hand over his face and finally fell back against the pillows stacked behind him, his energy beyond spent. This was not how he’d anticipated his first official op as Captain America panning out. “So why are you here? Because if you tell me you talked her down, I’ve got a bridge to sell you.”
“No,” Sam answered softly. “She went to ground.”
“Shocking.” He was being an asshole about it. Part of him knew that no matter the different tactics, they had the same end goal. Problem was that Sam’s tactics and Bucky’s willingness to go along with them had paved the way for her escape. She and her people were in the wind and there was no telling if they’d find her again through good intelligence or another explosion that cost innocent civilians their lives.
John felt a shudder run up his spine and he sucked in a painful breath. “I really wanted to work together.”
“No one’s gonna fault you for it,” Sam said. “We’ll finish this.”
“No you won’t.” He squeezed his eyes shut and pinched the bridge of his nose. He didn’t have a headache, per se, but it felt like he should have a headache. Like the stress should have locked everything up so tight that his head had no other choice but to ache.
“We’re free agents,” Bucky said. “Shield or no shield, you don’t have the authority to take us off this.”
“You’re right.” John let his eyes slip back open and met the former Howling Commando’s skeptical gaze. “But how’ve you guys been getting around? My guess is the same way that you got into the base: Sam’s Air Force connections.”
He could see the realization dawn on his face. “This is bullshit and you know it,” Sam growled and John knew this needed to get wrapped up sooner rather than later. He was exhausted, and he needed to rest so that he would be ready to hit the ground running as soon as they caught wind of where the Flag Smashers had gone to next. The only thing working in their favour right then was that they likely thought he was dead. That would buy them a couple of days at least.
“I’ll put you on a plane and send you home,” he promised. “What you do from there is up to you as long as you stay out of our way.”
There was a long moment that John thought they were going to keep pushing back, but Sam - to his credit - turned towards the door. Bucky didn’t move to immediately follow, but instead tilted his head as he studied John with that strange, unblinking stare of his. “Watch yourself, Walker. That serum you took doesn’t have a great track record.”
“So I hear.”
The door closed behind them and John waited a beat before finally relaxing against the pillows, his head tipping back and he winced at the pull on the wound in his chest. Olivia gave his hand a squeeze and he tried for a reassuring smile that he was pretty sure was a grimace at best.
“If you have to go back in, can’t you have them removed entirely?” she asked carefully.
“They’re not under us,” Lemar answered for him, dragging his chair so that it was in John’s line of vision without making him strain.
“Yeah, but they got in the way of you doing your job. They protected the woman who…”
John pulled her hand up to his lips, pressing a kiss against her knuckles. “They’re wrong and kind of assholes, but they’re heroes too. Sam helped take down Hydra and they both fought Thanos. They don’t deserve to have their reputations dragged through the mud. It’ll be fine.”
She glanced over to Lemar who offered a small shrug. “We’ve got some time and they won’t have the kind of resources we do. It should be okay.”
“Are you saying that because he’s saying that or because it’s true?” Olivia asked pointedly and John shot her an incredulous look.
“Aren’t you the one always telling me what a bad liar I am?”
“Unless you convince yourself of it. The Falcon and Steve Roger’s best friend Bucky Barnes.” His wife scrunched her nose a little at their names. “You forget I’ve known you since we were twelve. I saw the Howling Commando comics you two dorks used to read.”
John’s lips twitched up as he glanced at Lemar who wore a similar expression.
Olivia loosed a soft breath, her shoulders dropping in defeat. “Okay. I get it. This is what you boys do. All I’m asking is that you —“ she leaned down and gave him a quick kiss that felt like an unwarranted tease —- “give yourself whatever time you need to heal up. And you —“ she looked over at Lemar who gave her a cheeky grin in return — “have his back in every way you always have.”
“Yes ma’am,” Lemar answered with a mock salute.
Olivia turned back towards him and he reached up, motioning for her to lean in closer and she did, a skeptical look etched into her pretty features. When she was close enough he sat up just enough to pull her in, stealing the kiss he would have preferred a moment before. She laughed against him, leaning down so that he could sink back against the pillows, and didn’t break away until Lemar gave a snort of a laugh. “You two need a minute?”
“You mind grabbing that nurse to re-hook all of his machines before I throw them out the window?”
“Sure,” he chuckled.
Olivia turned back from where she was half-seated on the hospital bed and John felt himself relax just a little more as she leaned forward again to rest her forehead against his. “I know you.”
“Really, ‘cause —“
“Shut up. This is serious. I know you. I know how much your work means to you - especially this work - but at the end of the day your job is to come home to me. Got it?”
John let his eyes slip closed, reaching his hand up to tangle a long finger in her hair before the nurse could come in to tether him back down again. His thumb brushed her cheek and she leaned into his touch. “Got it,” he promised.
“Good.” She pressed another kiss to his lips that ended far too soon with a nurse who was very upset that she’d been kicked out earlier. John let her do her job without a fight, all the wires and IVs back where they were supposed to be. He tried to turn down the oxygen, but she insisted, and finally she left the three of them alone.
Finally. He was exhausted.
John was already drifting as he heard Lemar repositioning his chair and Olivia carefully climbed into the hospital bed with him, carefully wrapping an arm over his midsection and pressing her cheek into his shoulder. There was plenty of work to be done, but if he knew Lemar, he’d already gotten the ball rolling on things like securing Sam and Bucky a ride home if they would take it. How all that shook out would be a problem for tomorrow. Right then, despite the accelerated healing, he wasn’t anywhere near fighting ready. If he wanted to be ready to finish this - to protect the people that relied on him - he had to make good on his promise to the woman he loved. And sleep always came so much easier with her by his side.
----
Notes:
When I originally wrote this to fill a perfect Whumptover prompt, it was just supposed to be a oneshot, but then my brain does what it does and kept going to figure out how Sam and Bucky would have reacted to Karli stabbing (and nearly killing) John. Now that it's written, though, I feel like I kind of owe it to Sam and Bucky to let them have the little mini redemption arc that John got at the end of the show in canon. I just don't know how that will play out. I do know that I'd love to fill in the last remaining gaps in the stabbing/immediate aftermath from Lemar's POV and that would happen in a third installment, sooooooo...
If I can pin down a good path forward for Bucky and Sam, there'll be a third part. I just really need someone to talk me out of the additional plot bunnies nipping at my ankles that continue on past this story since it opens up all sorts of possibilities with John continuing as Cap and the Custer's Grove Trio all alive and well and as strong as ever. One particular plot bunny has to do with John and Lemar stumbling into having to investigate Val and getting tangled up with the Thunderbolts crew. Seriously. Someone talk me out of this :')
Warnings : A but of cursing and a shit tone of gay <3
[ author's note: ] I've been really into Sambucky again recently, and at this point I'm so done with trying to think of other ships. This ship will forever have my heart despite other ships that come to sail.
James Buchanan Barnes loathed the empty space of the mattress next to him. He loathed how prim and neat the cream sheets were. He despised the rightly order of the pillows. But most importantly, he hated the missing presence of Sam.
Despite what others thought, Bucky longed to be cuddled and caressed. He loved the sudden gestures Sam would provide out of the ordinary blue. He loved the surprise of Sam's arms around his stomach. His head, dangling with tire or snuggly warmth, resting on Bucky's vibranium shoulder.
It's been a week now since Sam had left for Egypt. A week too long for a home of two with only one in its vacancy.
Bucky knew that being apart from your parter every once in a while was okay, healthy, and suggested. The first few days were of total peace. It was nice lounging about in the house without the worry of the world apart from the occasional missions and precautionary runs he ran to secure the city. But as time went on and Bucky's thoughts clouded him and his longing for Sam grew, he grew frantic and needy. He missed Sam Wilson more than anything, and if Sam can't be home right now in this very bed, he wished that he was at least safe. With a roof over his head. With food in his plate. With a smile on his lips that gave everyone, him especially, hope of a better future.
Bucky inhaled the sharp cool and crisp air. Exhaling not long after. He pulled down a pillow from the mound of them on Sam's side. He chuckled. Sam always had a shit ton of pillows with him. He called it, "the bird-ly habit of a nest." At this thought, Bucky chuckled and cuddled the pillow into his chest. His head bowed down as he inhaled its scent- Sam's scent of the oceanic blues of the cologne he had given him. He missed it. His smell. His snores however small and adorable they are. He missed the way Sam's thumb would move back and forth on his neck as he held him dear in his arms. Comforting him through his occasional, but rarer occurrences of nightmares.
He closed his eyes expecting to finally fall asleep until a ringing blew into the closed room. Bucky hummed with a tinge of curiosity and immediately hoped that whoever was calling was his boyfriend. He sat up with the pillows on his lap and reached to his left, grabbing his phone. And as the words "Idiot Bird" appeared on the blurred familiar dialing screen, Bucky's wistfulness vanished and a smile, as bright as the moon's crescents, appeared. He pressed the green button in an instant and played Sam up on speaker.
He waited until a loud crackling sound bursted from the speaker. Then, a laugh.
"Bucky!" Sam proclaimed, although in a more whispered tone than a shout.
God he missed that voice. That call of his name in a tone so beloved to him, so familiar.
"Hey, baby. I miss you."
"I miss you too, so much. It's been a hell of a whirlwind back in Cairo. Barely had any time to sleep."
"Im sorry," Bucky apologized as he laid the phone down on the empty space next to him and rested his head down the pillows. "You should probably sleep then."
"Yeah.. But you know how it is with me and planes. I can't sleep for shit."
"Wait, planes?"
"Yep. Got the whole situation sorted sooner than I thought and after a few debriefs on the actual witnesses, I can finally go fucking home."
Bucky closed his eyes and breathed in a shaky breath. Exhaling a long moment after with a stuttering chuckle. "Good good.. I miss you so much you, Sam." You have no idea.
"I miss you too, Bucky. A lot. I think a part of the reason why I could barely sleep with the time they let me go to my hotel was because all I could think about was you."
"Oh?"
"Mhm, I was scared. I was scared that I won't be there."
Bucky didn't need Sam to say it, nor Sam need to say what I meant for Bucky to know. It was a silent knowledge between them and Bucky was thankful for Sam's silence and patience about his struggles. Bucky's nightmares weren't as prominent as it once was, but they lingered like a guilt. Even though he made his amends long ago, he was still terrified of what his monster had done. Who it had killed and who's lived it had destroyed for the purpose of others. The Winter Soldier was the past and as much as he intended to forget all of what happened, he knew Sam was right when he said that sometimes forgetting the past can only lead to more suffering. Bucky smiled to himself as he thought of what else Sam had told him. Healing meant facing your fears, not abandoning them.
"Don't worry, I haven't had one since the week before you left," Bucky answered truthfully with pride knowing how long its been since he had such horrible recollections.
"Good good. Don't worry, I'll be home soon. I'll make you steak, we'll stay up till 2 watching Disney movies, and stay up for another 30 minutes stuck like tape."
Bucky, imagining every moment Sam had described, smiled. "I'd love that. Will there be kisses?"
"So many."
"Perfect."
A yawn wrapped around the air a Bucky felt sleep pull him closer and closer. Knowing Sam's voice was close and knowing the whole of him was closer, he was finally in a state of peace against the restlessness. His body relaxing. His eyelids refraining from wanting to open.
"Sleep, baby. I'll be here."
"Promise?" Bucky whispered.
"I promise."
Pulling the blankets closer and Sam's soft pillow even closer to his chest, Bucky slept off with a sentence last spoken in a whisper. A whisper loud enough for the receiving end to hear and giggle at his boyfriend's sleepy and adorable voice.
Listen, I have no understanding of how to use this platform to my advantage, but I figured I would fling this into the ether nonetheless.
I'm participating in Marvel Trumps Hate! What is MTH you ask? An annual event where you can bid on fan creations/services, and 100% of the monies all good to non-profit organizations vetted by the organizers.
You can find my auction here where I am offering a 3k-10k fic that will be your baby, but be my brand. What is my brand, you ask? Take a gander at my A03! See the pining! The bickering as a love language! Team as Family Vibes! Did I mention feels? Delightful secondary cast?
(Spoilers: Yelena being Bucky's sibling is now 100% my brand, y'all.)
Not sure what you might want me to write? Might I present you with some options?
Picking Up Yelena: I have probably 8 different versions in my head of how Yelena could join up with Sam and Bucky following FATWS, you could help me pick which one to write next! Running into each other during competing missions? Clint leaving her wrapped up with a duct tape bow on Bucky's doorstep for Christmas? Joaquín and Yelena having a series of meet-cutes where they both think the other one doesn't recognize their attempts to spy on each other? The choice is yours!
Fury Road AU: Mad Max!Sam just wants to be left alone to survive in his own way, but it looks like he's going to need the help of Imperator!WinterSoldier for at least the time being. And when he figures out what the Imperator is smuggling out of Hydra's territory, will he really be able to turn a blind eye, or will he finally remember what it's like to care about others again?
Hawkeye and the Winter Soldier: My Winterhawk roots live on! A reimagining of what the post-Endgame timeline could have looked like if Bucky and Clint ended up on a globe trotting mission together instead of Bucky and Sam. (Sorry, Flagsmashers, your plot was too incomprehensible, we'll be swapping that out now.)
Sequels!: Have a favorite of mine you want to spend more time in? Request a sequel! (I promise you, I've been thinking about it too)
Something Completely Different: Honestly I love prompts, we won't have problems if you know exactly what you want me to write.
I've honestly already been blown away by the enthusiasm and joy found in MTH and I hope everyone gets every auction they want by Saturday's end--happy bidding, fandom!
An Archive of Our Own, a project of the Organization for Transformative Works
Torres had seemed to love being Falcon for the past two years, which was why it was kind of a shock when he- very casually- announced he was giving up the wings over dinner one Tuesday. It was, otherwise, a normal Tuesday with a fish curry and vegetables on the side.
