Steve, He-Wolf of the USA

[plavkiy]

It had all been a blur. Bucky doesn't know what Zola did to him, but he has to be hallucinating or dreaming, still strapped down and repeating his numbers, because Steve is here and he's big. He looks good--healthy--and Bucky's so relieved all he can do is mumble about Steve's size.

"I thought you were smaller."

He's dazed and he sounds it, but he's been in this odd sort of fog for so long that it could have been hours or years and he'd really expected to die here. It's a risk to rescue a few soldiers and he'd realized that early on it was unlikely anyone would come, but here's Steve, the one person he'd wanted to see the most.

Comments

[assembles]

Bucky doesn't say anything about the jump Steve had just cleared, even though he's probably dying to ask. This isn't the time -- they need to get out of here to make sure they'll actually get the chance to discuss this all in detail later on.

Steve takes Bucky's hand, somehow registering its warmth even though the place is already sweltering from the flames below, and pulls himself up. Steve had defied every order he'd been given to come out here and get Bucky and the rest of the 107th, but it's only in this moment that it sinks in that he actually succeeded in what he set out to do.

Peggy and Howard, they're going to be in a world of trouble for what they did. But Steve hopes that when he gets all these men back to camp, they'll realize they'd been right to put their faith in him.

They race toward the elevator side-by-side, Steve jamming the button and then throwing himself inside as soon as the doors open. They're lucky that it's still functional, though Steve is half expecting it to plummet to the ground floor at any second.

It doesn't, and they make it out safely, eventually finding an exit door that grants them the relief of cold air not polluted with smoke.

"Keep running!" Steve barks as he books it away from the facility, waiting for the explosion that eventually comes and knocks even him off his feet.