Steve is struggling. He's been struggling since he came out of the ice--which is what the older version of himself has been trying to warn Tony about, without knowing how to phrase the warning. He's physically enhanced, mentally enhanced, and some of the restructuring and shoring-up of his brain gives him superhuman cognitive abilities, eidetic memory, but that doesn't mean he's immune to emotional trauma. And he's been hit with a lot of it. It's hard to say whether he's held up better than a normal human would, under the changes he's been subjected to, or worse.
He's not well. Not as depressed as the version Tony's become close with, but much angrier, and more detached from the world around him. It's not his world.
He is beyond reading into the way Tony's sprawled in the jumpseat, too, past being able to note it as a show of trust. All that he can do for the moment is pick apart the words he's being fed. Buying time. Nine billion people. Gods and monsters and magical stones. How can any of this possibly be real?
Maybe it isn't. Maybe he's dreaming, or having that psychotic break SHIELD has been watching him for. The world around him has a faint bluish haze he's just now noticing, and the next things Tony says seem to come from a long distance away, moving slow and languid like bubbles deep under icy water.
Barnes. HYDRA. Brainwashed.
"Bucky...?" His single-word response is strangely soft and childlike, probably a truly bad sign. But even if he's dissociating out of sheer shock and loss, he's still cognizant enough to recognize the implication. If Tony's telling him the truth, and Bucky is alive, has been in HYDRA hands for seventy fucking years--and when he
found him on Zola's table before all he could say at first was his name, rank and serial number--
how could he still be alive through seventy years of torture?--except Steve survived decades of ice and Zola had given Bucky something, he barely remembered what, did not want to talk about it
so it's not impossible except it
is because everything
since the serum has been. fucking. impossible--
He's not even fully aware of what his body is doing when he launches himself out of the pilot's seat. He can kind of see the plane from outside, watch through the windshield as he turns, scepter in hand and more or less flings himself on top of Tony with the staff between them, pinning him--unless he dodges exceptionally quickly--where he lies.
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Date: 2018-10-11 11:36 pm (UTC)He's not well. Not as depressed as the version Tony's become close with, but much angrier, and more detached from the world around him. It's not his world.
He is beyond reading into the way Tony's sprawled in the jumpseat, too, past being able to note it as a show of trust. All that he can do for the moment is pick apart the words he's being fed. Buying time. Nine billion people. Gods and monsters and magical stones. How can any of this possibly be real?
Maybe it isn't. Maybe he's dreaming, or having that psychotic break SHIELD has been watching him for. The world around him has a faint bluish haze he's just now noticing, and the next things Tony says seem to come from a long distance away, moving slow and languid like bubbles deep under icy water.
Barnes. HYDRA. Brainwashed.
"Bucky...?" His single-word response is strangely soft and childlike, probably a truly bad sign. But even if he's dissociating out of sheer shock and loss, he's still cognizant enough to recognize the implication. If Tony's telling him the truth, and Bucky is alive, has been in HYDRA hands for seventy fucking years--and when he
found him on Zola's table before all he
could say at first was his name, rank and serial number--
how could he still be alive through seventy years of
torture?--except Steve survived decades of ice and Zola had given Bucky
something, he barely remembered what, did not want to talk about it
so it's not impossible
except
it
is
because everything
since the serum
has been. fucking. impossible--
He's not even fully aware of what his body is doing when he launches himself out of the pilot's seat. He can kind of see the plane from outside, watch through the windshield as he turns, scepter in hand and more or less flings himself on top of Tony with the staff between them, pinning him--unless he dodges exceptionally quickly--where he lies.
"WHERE?!"