Darcy/Johnny/Bucky. Soul Mark AU. <3
Nix, my lady, my babe, I hope you enjoy this! <3
Pairing: Darcy Lewis/Johnny Storm/James ‘Bucky’ Barnes
They told him he had no soul. And his skin was clean (all but the scars that ran around his left shoulder where they’d made him into a machine) so he believed them.
So when the bonfire boy with the startling blue eyes had said to him—in the middle of a battle field, in the middle of the city, in the middle of the day—
“Well, hello there, beautiful. Would you like my number?”
And the feeling of flames spread down his left hip, licking and biting at his skin, he assumed they were real flames. And he threw the other man across the square and returned to his mission.
It wasn’t until they’d herded him back into the base, and stripped him for maintenance, that he saw the blue trace of fire down his skin and the spikey, twiggy words of invitation.
They wiped him and threw him in the cryofreezer.
But no matter how many times they told him he was a machine, he was their weapon to wield, he was nothing…
They silly words were on his skin, framed by blue fire.
Darcy was sweating it out on the dance floor of some too loud, too crowded, too pricey club. But, fuck it! She finally had her damn degree. Now she could stare down the fathomless maw of student debt and limited job prospects like everyone else. Time to celebrate!
With a bunch of strangers.
Cause Jane was definitely still in the lab, waist deep in theories, probably still sounding them out as if Darcy was in the room.
She couldn’t even be mad about it, really.
There was a body behind hers, like a heater inside of an already too hot club. And she was absolutely ready to turn around and tell them to politely back up to the next available booty cause she was really just here for the cardio.
Except she didn’t. She turned and he slotted them together, legs fitting into place like puzzle pieces, and she was staring up at muscles, and wicked blue eyes, and a suggestive smirk that was barely concealing a childlike grin of delight.
“You look like somebody who could take me home and keep me in bed for days,” Darcy said, blinking in surprise. She added, “In a not creepy way.”
He stiffened in front of her, eyes puzzled, and a hand came up to settle over his chest.
He spoke and she watched his lips make the words, but there was no hearing him over the bass. It didn’t matter. A ring of spikey, sharp heat circled her hips, stirring up shock and arousal all at once.
They stood stock still on the dance floor, staring at one another. And then she took his hand and led him out of the club and into a cab. They went to her apartment and stayed in bed for days.
She explained that the geometric pattern that was now covering his chest was bits of circuitry she doodled when nervous and he explained why the words floating in the blue flames under her belly read, “I don’t know what you said but I promise to be good if you don’t run away like the last one.”
Darcy was eating Clint’s cheerios in the common room when Steve brought Bucky Barnes into the Tower for the first time. (After the de-conditioning and the early rounds of therapy and a long, quiet vacation in Canada while The Winter Soldier could be quietly brushed away from the public conscious and replaced with the POW and War Hero.) She froze behind the counter, debating on whether or not to sink down out of sight, or scurry from the room while they were turned the other way.
This was the guy. This was the guy.
It hadn’t been hard to figure out from Johnny’s description of him. Not after Hydra had burst forth from SHIELD like an Alien baby out of Sigourney Weaver.
Johnny’s other soulmate was James Buchanan Barnes. The Winter Soldier.
Tall and wide, wider than Johnny, with dark hair and icy sharp eyes. He had a beard growing in that Darcy badly wanted to scratch her fingers into. And while she’d always imagined him in the terrifying leather get up she’d seen blurry photos of, he was standing by the windows in jeans and a heavy sweater. Looking like any other outrageously handsome guy might, aside from the silver fingers peeking out from his long sleeve.
He was glancing at her out of the corner of his eye and Darcy could feel the blood rushing into her cheeks.
She needed to call Johnny. She needed to get out of here. She needed to know if she was part of a closed circuit or if she and this stranger were two links connecting to Johnny. (It was alright if they were, Johnny was near to bursting with love and Darcy knew she would never be an afterthought to him.)
So she put the box of cereal back on the shelf and made ready to escape.
Steve and Bucky were standing in her way, blocking her exit around the island.
“Buck, this is Darcy Lewis, she works mostly with Jane and Tony in the labs but she’s a bit of a jack of all trades really. Darcy this is my friend, James Barnes.”
“’S good to finally see a pretty face after months with this punk,” Bucky said to her.
The words were rusty, his tongue nearly tripping over them, and his expression was a little panicked as he spoke. But there were flurries around her chest, snowflakes kissing at the skin of her breasts and then warming like coals running across her ribs to her back. She gaped at him, at the tan calloused hand he had extended to her, and her own rose to meet his.
“Oh,” she said, and his hand twitched in hers. She felt tears welling up in her eyes and a smile was stretching so fast across her face it hurt her cheeks. “We’re all gonna be really happy, just so you know.”
Little lines and connections and branches grew out from under his sleeve down to his fingertips. He blinked at her and Steve stared between them, eyes wide.
“Do you know…?” Bucky’s metal hand traced over his hip and Darcy had to bite her lip to keep her face from cracking apart.
He stepped up close to her, released her hand to wipe away the twin tears that had spilled over onto her cheeks.
“I’ll introduce you,” she told him.
Johnny let himself into Darcy’s apartment, hefting up the bag of groceries and wine and stepping inside. There was music playing and he could hear her speaking in the kitchen, a low and mellow voice answering her. His chest squeezed hard. (He’d heard about the news in the Tower. But this was just dinner with Darcy and he could settle down and not put those anxious hopes on his date with his girl.)
There was a little squeak of excitement and then sock-feet skidding across her floor boards as she ran in from the kitchen to greet him. She pulled the groceries out of his hold and bounced up into his arms for a kiss.
“Hey, cutie,” he said, laughing.
She was giddy and his heart was beating too fast.
“Hi!” she said, beaming. “I’ve got somebody here to meet you so…yeah, come on. I have no chill!”
She had his hand in hers and was yanking him to the kitchen, and he couldn’t find his feet underneath him.
Darcy squeezed his hand once once in the doorway to the kitchen and then pushed him ahead of her. His other soulmate was standing against the counter. If Johnny had passed him on the street he might not have recognized this cozy, smiling, bearded babe for the sooty eyed warrior he’d flirted with in the middle of new york city ten years ago. Everything inside of him was spinning like a merry go round on a playground, some invisible hand pushing it faster, faster, faster, until he thought it might take off out of his skin altogether. He was probably too close to starting yet another kitchen fire in Darcy’s apartment.
“Hey good lookin’,” the other man said, grin wobbling anxiously. “Can I still get that number?”
Ice landed on his shoulders, melting in curling rivulets down Johnny’s back until it pooled at the base of his spine, warm and twisting.
He laughed, the nerves and panic and joy falling out of him with the sound.
Johnny was dozing on his stomach while Bucky and Darcy traced the frost and currents of patterns on his back, the words that lined down his spine.
“Just remembered,” Bucky said, and Johnny peeked one drowsy eye open. “These melting patterns ain’t snow. This is the old city subway system.”
“Our bridge and tunnel boy,” Darcy murmured and Johnny smiled, hearing their kiss.
Darcy shifted, worming her way from draped over them to snuggled betweean them. Bucky wiggled to make room for her but Johnny just hid his grin in his pillow and let her work for it. There was nothing he didn’t love about the feeling of a naked Darcy squirming against him.
“Does this mean I’ve got the G train somewhere on me,” he asked, frowning.
Darcy snorted but Bucky just traced his finger over one of Johnny’s ribs. “Yeah, right here.”
“What’ve I got?” Darcy asked, elbowing Johnny so she could spread out for Bucky’s perusal.
Johnny could hear the wet sounds of kisses landing against skin. These crazy fuckers weren’t gonna let him get any rest were they? (He loved it.)
“Here’s the Sea Beach Line…” Darcy hummed and wiggled next to him. “And here’s the Brighton…”
Johnny rolled to his side and sat up, watching Bucky lick across a diagonal line that followed Darcy’s shoulder blade. He glanced up at Johnny and grinned, leaning across Darcy’s back to kiss him. Johnny could taste the salt from her skin and faint traces of himself from earlier.
