A/N:

Ah, this is a mess mostly. The most obvious thing to mention is that the bit at the start, about the cube, is from the comic storyline because I honestly cannot remember how the movie ended. Dialogue in italics are from the comic too.

Secondly, I have no idea how to write Steve.

Thirdly, if there are any errors, please tell me, this was a very hastily written birthday fic and has not been thoroughly checked.

The apartment was smaller than the one he had before, the one now riddled with bullet holes and peppered with shards from a shattered window, but it suited Steve just fine. It had a big enough kitchen to move about it, and a nicely placed breakfast bar that acted in lieu of a couch. The bathroom was small, he had to squeeze past the sink to get to the toilet and the shower was little more than a hose attached to a tap, but it worked. There was only one bedroom with one bed, and therein lay the problem because Steve wasn't living in this apartment alone.

He'd found him a little way off, sitting with his knees drawn to his chest and his head buried in the crook of his elbow. He'd tucked himself under the outdoor stairs of some worn down, abandoned safehouse, and sat with the cold seeping in to his back and his thighs. He thought maybe they'd all buy it, would see him disintegrate in to ash as he crushed the cube between his fingers and that they would move on. Maybe Sharon did, maybe everyone did, but Bucky should have known better, because Steve knew him better.

He found him, and Bucky should have known that he would, but Bucky wasn't sure what he knew any more.

Steve was talking low in his ear, putting his hands under Bucky's arms and he hauled him off the grass, before wrapping the right one around Bucky's waist. Bucky didn't know if he was supposed to be responding, but it didn't seem like Steve expected him to because he just kept talking, the words almost foreign but the tone so familiar it made Bucky's head hurt.

He wasn't all there yet, but he had enough clarity to cling to Steve like a lifeline as he was manoeuvred in to the back of Natasha's car. She didn't speak directly to Bucky, and Bucky saw her knuckles bone white against the steering wheel as she drove. She chatted idly to Steve, but when they were fixed on the road, her eyes were trained on Bucky via the rear-view mirror. Steve said her name low, almost apologetically, and she pulled her eyes away from Bucky's and said "yeah. I know." before settling back in her seat in an attempt to relax. It didn't work, her hands said as much, but she stopped staring long enough to think about something else.

When they got to Steve's apartment, Bucky brushed him off, assuring him that he could walk on his own. It wasn't entirely the truth, his legs were leaden and his left arm seemed to have its own gravitational pull, but he knew he had to do this. Had to get on his own damn feet and make conscious decisions, no matter how small they were. Steve looked at him like he knew, and of course he did. He always did, and Bucky feels sick at the thought of how wrong this all could have gone.

"Shoot me. If you truly don't know me...then just do it."

Bucky squashes down the memory. It was real, he knew that much. Steve had really said that to him. What Bucky couldn't place, though, was whether or not the hand that had twitched on the gun had been real - whether it had moved to pull the trigger, or release it. He hoped he never knew the answer.

The stairs go on forever, and each step is sheer agony, but there's comfort in knowing that Steve's behind him, with his arms raised and out, ready to catch him should he stumble. They reach the top, and Steve twists the key in the lock before stepping aside and letting Bucky enter first.

"It's not much." He says, closing the door behind him. Bucky says nothing, stepping further in to the small square of space to make room for them both. "Sleeping arrangement for tonight is you take the bed, I take the floor."

"Cap-" Bucky starts, but Steve won't hear a word of it.

"I'll get a second mattress tomorrow, but for tonight a duvet's fine. Bucky," he says, placing a hand on his shoulder. "I want you to feel safe here, alright?"

He says it with such sincerity, such open honesty in those blue eyes, that Bucky almost crumples. He holds himself together, just so, just with the thought to the shame he'd feel if he broke now, but Steve's looking at him again like he knows. When Bucky speaks, it comes out all wrong, like he'd been denied water for weeks. Not an unfamiliar feeling, not by any stretch, and another wave of nausea washes over him, but his words are light.

"C'mon, Cap, we shared beds when we were kids. There's no harm in it now."

Steve's smile is soft, and sad and Bucky could damn near cry at the sight of it.

"You're right." Steve says, before adding on "but I'm getting the left side" as an afterthought.

It's so simple. It's so organic, this back and forth between them, but it still fits all wrong. Bucky fits all wrong. Bucky looks at Steve, and he sees light, and glory and warmth, but he's afraid to ask Steve what he sees facing him.

"You were better than this!"

Bucky feels his body swaying seconds before he feels Steve's hands on his hips, all ten digits reminding him of sensor pads in the worst way. The touch makes Bucky's skin crawl, and it shouldn't, it shouldn't because it's Steve but he can't remember the last time someone touched him decently, can't remember the last time someone touched him gently and with good intent. Bucky wants to push his hands away, but he can't quite manage as he digs his own fingers in to the faded grey material of Steve's shirt.

He's lowered in to an almost ratty armchair, and Steve places a hand firmly on Bucky's forehead for just a few seconds, before apologising under his breath and moving over to the sink to fill a glass with water. He hands it over, and Bucky swallows it greedily, wiping the back of his mouth with his left hand without thinking. He lowers it from his face, staring openly at his own anatomy.

No, not his own. Theirs.

"Want to talk about it?" Steve presses gently, and Bucky thinks for a second before shaking his head.

"Not now. Not-" Not when I'm not sure I'm even myself. Not when I'm not sure I won't do something. Not when I'm not sure I won't hurt you. Bucky says none of these, but the defeated slump of his shoulders fill in the blanks for him. "Not right now."

"I got it." Steve says. "Don't worry, Buck. You're back, alright? You're you."

Bucky laughs besides himself, and it's as rich as it is dark. "You can't know that, Cap. I don't know if I'll never not be what they made me. If I-if I'll ever be me again." He runs his right hand through his hair, wincing when it catches on a knot. Steve places his fingers on Bucky's wrist, and Bucky once again fights against the bile rising in his throat.

"I know you." He says, simply.

"You knew me." Bucky corrects, feebly.

"No." Steve says, and his voice is firm and commanding. "None of that back there was you. None of it. This? This right here? That's all you. Look, you might not be all here right now, and that's fine, but don't think for a second that I'm turning my back on you."

Bucky looks up at Steve, and sees a radiant determination that he wished he could feel. He shakes his head.

"I still have to wonder where that wimpy kid from Manhattan's gotten off to."

Steve smiles, and it's genuine, and Bucky hopes that the weak one he gives in return is the same.

"First thing's first." Steve says. "We need to get you looking like your old self again."

Bucky looks at him in question, before noting that Steve is looking pointedly at the crown of his head. He nods in agreement. They shaved his face back then, only to keep the mask clean and not for any comfort reasons, but they never bothered to let him cut his hair. Bucky holds his hands out in front of his, and notices with disdain that they are shaking, and visibly so.

"I don't think I can." He points on, but Steve shakes his head.

"I'll do it. That is, if you'll trust me to." Steve presses.

"I trust you." Bucky answers, instantly, but he wished it didn't sound so much like a lie.

Steve nods, and walks over to pull a rickety stool in front of the bathroom sink. He tells Bucky to sit in it, back to the mirror, as he roots around in the drawer for scissors and a comb. Bucky does as he asks, taking off his shirt as he goes to keep it hair-free, and he shudders as his back hits against chilled porcelain. Steve comes in and stands over him, between his legs, and reaches around to run the taps. As Steve lowers his head back in to the sink, Bucky feels panic rising in his chest.

It's all too familiar, the slant of his body, the compression on his head, the hands and the fingers and the burning lights and all he can hear is the water rushing in to his ears and pretends only to himself that it doesn't sound so much like electricity and machinery. His eyes squeeze shut and he struggles to keep his body still, and he tries to focus on Steve's hand on his shoulder, his right shoulder away from the juncture of scar tissue and metal alloy, and tries to think of it as a support rather than a restraint. When all the sweat and grit is rinsed out of the tangled mess that Bucky's hair had become, Steve retracts his hands and keeps them to himself, trying to coax Bucky in to meeting his eye.

"Hey." He says gently. "Hey, we don't have to do this right now. I shouldn't have suggested it, Buck, I'm sorry."

Bucky purses his lips as he exhales, but he says "it's fine" and "I'm okay", knowing full well that he doesn't mean it, and that Steve doesn't believe him. "I want you to do it now." He assures him, and it's true, he wants the weight of the hair off his shoulders, but more because he's clinging to the hope that seeing his face at his most familiar will be able to centre him. Steve asks him twice if he's sure, and when he's satisfied that Bucky is calm, he hands Bucky a towel to dry off the worst of the water, and a comb to get rid of the tangles, before he has Bucky spin 180 degrees in the chair so he has his back to Steve.

"You want me to stop at any point, just say the word. And uh, just to be clear, I've never done this before."

Bucky snorts. "Well, you can't make it look much worse." He says, waving his hand to tell Steve to start.

Steve takes the comb from Bucky, and combs out the tangles he couldn't reach, before swapping it for he scissors and starting at the bottom. It fine at first, almost calming in its repetitive nature, but as the scissors move up further, Bucky finds himself a lot more hyper aware of them. One cut is too close to his ear, and the harsh rasp of metal on human hair feels deafening. Bucky can't help himself and he jumps, and his hand, his real hand with all its pulsating warmth, flies to Steve's wrist. His fingers tighten quickly, and the scissors clatter to the floor as Steve drops them.

"Easy." He soothes. "Easy, Buck. It's me, alright. It's me. I'm not gonna do anything, alright?"

Bucky knows this rationally, knows that Steve would never, but it's hard to separate things out. Then and now, them and him, this and that, it was like a finely woven mesh that Bucky had only begun to pick apart. It was a slow process, too slow, and Bucky didn't know if he was ready for any of it. He relays this last thought to Steve, and he responds by crouching in between Bucky's legs.

"Listen to me." He says, his hands hovering over Bucky's thighs. It's a request for permission, and Bucky grants it with a nod and Steve begins to rub soothing circles in to the skin. "Bucky, you can't expect everything to be okay right now. No-one can, and no-one does. Do you know what you are?"

Bucky's own mind supplies a dozen words, all of them more cutting than the last, so he keeps them to himself and shakes his head, loose hair falling on to his bare shoulders. Steve brushes these away with light fingers, and Bucky exhales slower this time.

"A survivor." Steve eventually supplies, and Bucky almost laughs.

"I didn't have any choice." He regrets saying it as soon as it leaves his mouth, as soon as the pained empathy flashes across Steve's handsome features. "I mean, surviving or dying. There wasn't much difference. I didn't survive anything, Cap. I'd already died. They only kept me mobile because I was of some use."

"Mobile." Steve repeats. "Don't talk about yourself like you're some sort of object."

"But I am, aren't I?" Bucky asks him, voice on the verge of cracking. "I wasn't a person, I was a weapon. What's changed? Now all I am is a weapon with a conscience."

"No!" Steve says, and it's one of the rare times Bucky has ever heard him raise his voice. "Bucky, that's them talking, not you. You are not a weapon."

"Then what am I?"

"You're my best friend." Steve says, and Bucky feels his throat close. He hates himself for it, and resents the telling, hot wetness that stings his eyes before spilling over, and travelling down his cheeks.

He says, "Steve" and he's all too aware of how broken, how damaged and how raw he sounds. His hands reach out on their own, and Steve knows, of course he does, and he moves in to them without question. His arms are security around Bucky, and though Bucky knows he's shaking, he can tell that Steve is too. It's still too much, but this contact makes it feel like some of the burden is being shifted to Steve, and that he's accepting it willingly.

They stay like that for an age, until Bucky's face has dried, and until Steve's arms can bring themselves to loosen.

"Come on." He says. "We'll finish this tomorrow."

Bucky allows himself to be lifted, and walked to the small door to the bedroom. He perches himself on the right side, and Steve walks around to the left, peeling off his own shirt as he goes, followed by his jeans which he replaces with loose fitting bottoms. Bucky has no pyjamas of his own, and is unprepared to be so bare, even in front of Steve who had seen him with less before, many years ago, and so he makes do with his combat trousers.

They climb under the top sheet, Steve laying on his back and Bucky turning his back on him to face the wall. He's lying on his metal arm, but only feels it in his shoulder. Fifteen minutes pass, and both of them are painfully aware of each other, of fragmented breath and stock still bodies that are too afraid or too unsure to touch. Bucky's not sure he wants this, but he has to ask, has to allow himself to adjust to being close to someone without fear gripping him, so after another five minutes of working himself up to it, he asks Steve in a small voice if he would hold him. Steve, true to himself, makes sure Bucky knows what he's asking before he moves, and when Bucky gives him the go ahead, he is still cautious, ready to pull out at the first sign of Bucky's panic.

His right arm curls around Bucky, and he shifts closer until his front is against Bucky's back, just so. It's overwhelming, and Bucky doesn't have the capacity to figure out if that's a good thing or a bad thing, so he thinks of something else and laces his fingers with Steve's.

They're not sure who falls asleep first, and it's not an easy rest as Bucky fits in his sleep every half hour, but when dawn breaks Bucky realises that for the first time in a long time, he has started to feel like himself again.