[I]

[onlyforthedream]

There are, immediately, the smells of motor oil; mortar; gunsmoke and the sea. Not the warm, fragrant azure waters that surround the island of Tabula Rasa, but those colder, sharper, stormier waters of the North Atlantic. I know where I am just from breathing in the air, although I also know it can’t be possible. Or shouldn't be, at the very least. My hands are gripping the handlebars of what I recognize, from the sound of the engine as well as my memory, to be a DKW NZ350. A ‘43. I know this bike.

God help me, I know exactly where I am.

I’ve had this dream. Correction- I’ve had this nightmare, more nights than I haven’t, since I woke up to a post-war world. This, what’s happening now, this isn’t a nightmare. This is living it. I know. I can tell the difference, by now.

I also know I’m not alone. Even as the end of the runway, the sharp drop off of the cliff looming ahead of us, rushes up to meet us- as the experimental drone plane that ended the war for me pulls away by critical, creeping inches to my left- I’m turning my head to call over my shoulder to the only other person who could be here with me.

“Bucky?!”

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[onlyapassenger]

Wind is whipping through my hair and past my ears, nearly drowning out the din around me: the rumble of the motorcycle, the roar of the plane, the crash of the water below. All I see, though, is army green. My eyes are locked on someone's back. My arms are wrapped around their waist... And I'd say I don't remember when I put them there, but that's a lie. I know exactly where I am, and who I'm with...

I just don't remember when I fell asleep... And judging by the fact that I can feel my left arm, my best guess is I didn't. This is actually happening, inasmuch as whatever sick S.O.B. sent me here can make it happen.

The question is if I'm alone... Or if Steve remembers where we ought to be, too.

"Cap!" Bucky shouts, voice already raw though he knows the true horror's only just begun, if this is anything like Russia. He tears his gaze upwards, catching only a glimpse of Steve's face before his attention is quickly diverted towards the plane, his body already moving through the motions it's done countless times before in every nightmare imaginable . His right hand rests on Steve's shoulder, his left outstretched before them both as he pulls himself up, and it's sheer force of habit that finds him adding, "I can make it!"

[onlyforthedream.livejournal.com]

The lurch of panic, of adrenaline and fear and dread that those words generate is as disorienting as the rest of it. This can’t happen again. I cannot let this happen again, but instead of stopping, instead of doing anything right, I grip the throttle tighter like it’s a damn life line and shout into the wind, “Bucky! Wait!”

[onlyapassenger]

The motorcycle drops out from underneath them when it reaches the cliff's edge, falling down, down, down into the water that will soon become their temporary grave. It's a simple matter of physics that sees them propelled through the air, but in the moment -- past or present, he isn’t sure -- Bucky's convinced it's sheer adrenaline. He hits the plane with enough force to knock him breathless, his left hand finding purchase on the fuselage, while his right arm rests flat on the wing.

"Got it!"

[onlyforthedream.livejournal.com]

God help me, he’s going for it. Maybe it is a dream. Maybe it has to be. Doesn’t it have to be? A nightmare. I feel the rounded metal edge of the wing slam against my ribs, my fingers scrabble for purchase against the seams of the metal sheets and find- nothing.

“Wait!” I yell, pushing past the pain in my stomach, ignoring that the wind should have been knocked out of me. I can’t afford to have had the wind knocked out of me. I have to warn him. It’s probably-

“It’s probably booby trapped!”

I can’t find a place to get a grip. I feel myself slipping backward and fight against it, straining to reach farther up and can’t, can’t get any ground back.

Oh, God.

[onlyapassenger]

Bucky knows the warning will come, and still it falls on deaf ears. He's already hoisted himself further up the plane, his fingers humming from the vibration as he fights to hang on. Though he doesn't notice it as it happens, he knows, too, that his sleeve has already caught under part of the metal plating, his focus dedicated to finding the bomb despite already knowing its location.

It's déjà vu. Time will reset. If this is anything like Russia, time will reset, but... I don't know what else to do. The plane has to be stopped, and no matter how much I wish this day had gone different, that's never going to change. This is bigger than me. Bigger than us. Why are we back here?

"I see it!" he screams through gritted teeth. "Aw, God, Cap, it's gonna blow!"

[onlyforthedream.livejournal.com]

What I want to happen next doesn’t matter. It’s a lesson that most of the villains of my acquaintance have, sometimes unintentionally and sometimes not, beaten into me over the years. Nothing I do will ever undo this. Nothing will ever stop it from happening. I try, though, the only fruitless, hollow ways I can. The plane’s incline steepens and my fingertips slip. I can’t catch myself, but Bucky’s sleeve is caught. He won’t be able to pull it free until it’s too late. And-

“No!”

I won’t be able to free him.

“I’m losing my grip-!”

For another eighty years.

“Drop off, Bucky!” I call out, uselessly, desperately, my diaphragm and lungs and throat burning with the effort, because I’ve already begun to fall.

“Let go!” My eyes are wide as I fall back, even though I don’t want to see it. I can’t look away from him, though, from this final moment. I never can. I have neither the right nor the ability.

[onlyapassenger]

Bucky Barnes' life is hanging in the balance by a literal thread, and though he has the comfort of the future to set his mind at ease, cold as it may be, fear and panic and dread finally pierces through the determination. His heart's trying to beat its way clear through his chest, and though he hasn't any time to spare, for one second, he wishes he could die from that instead.

Time slows... I remember this. Times slows and fragments...

"I can't!" he shouts, trying to wrench his arm free, survival instinct kicking in, even though history tells him it's futile to bother. "I'm stuck!"

[onlyforthedream.livejournal.com]

I can’t actually hear him. I can see his lips move, I can... almost make out the words, but I know what he’s saying. Combined, it’s enough. My own voice is even difficult to hear over the sound of the wind and the roar of the engine, the scream ripping from my throat, a protest that goes unheard by fate, God, or, I assume, Bucky.

No, I think, No. No. No. When the plane explodes, as I knew it would, as it couldn’t help but do, the heat and force of it slam into me and send me rocketing into the water. It’s like an ice cold wall coming up to meet me, to shatter and surge up around me, washing the billowing orange smoke in murky green as it pulls me down. It fills my mouth and my nose as well as my eyes but it can’t block out what’s emblazoned on them and will be for the next half a century. Then I’m numb, from the shock and the icy waters, and then the world is gone.