Chapter Text
Cap knelt in the icy mud, holding his friend’s head up out of the muck. Blood bubbles past his companion’s lips as he tries to speak, it is a harsh and hopeless sort of a sound. In the distance there is gunfire, an explosion closer by, mortars churning up the wet earth. Cap shushes his fallen friend.
“Shh, now, you don’t have to say anything.” He whispers, just loud enough that the soldier can hear him. “It's okay.” He wipes at the blood and tries to give a brave face to the man.
“N-no.” Comes from the lips of the dying man. “You gotta. . . gotta go on. . . for us boys. You gotta be the symbol. . .” He chokes and tries to catch his breath again, the sound a ragged gasp more than a breath. “Symbol of freedom and, and what's right.”
It was then that a mortar struck close by and a spray of soil came up from the ripped up ground. Cap raised a red, white and blue shield up, protecting them both from the debris, some of which were sizable pebbles. The dying man took a turn for the worse and began to cough hard, hacking up blood and wetly trying to suck air back into his lungs. He’s going to die, that is evident to both of them. They both know.
With the last of his strength the dying soldier raises his hand and taps his finger on Cap’s shield, right on the grimy white star. “A. . . Symbol.” He rasps and his hand goes limp, as he shuffles off this mortal coil.
Cap’s chin drops to his chest and he sheds a tear as he closes the man’s eyes. He looks over the young face, he notes grimly, that he’s more of a boy than a man really. Younger than Cap himself.
“Steve!” Someone further along calls and Cap jumps up, grabbing his shield. He’s needed, the dead soldier is right, he has to be a symbol, has to uphold righteousness, and hope, he. . . He trips.
“Cut!” the director calls and the helmet comes off, the dead soldier sits up, spitting the sickly sweet corn syrup blood out.
The shield is handed to someone from Properties and this man who is no longer Captain America walks right past the director and cameras, frustrated at having to reshoot this damned scene for the fifth time that afternoon.
How hard was it to just walk down an embankment on a closed set? It wasn’t even really mud for chrissakes!
This movie was meant to be his big break; Bucky Barnes fresh off the B movie circuit, onto the big screen in technicolor as Captain America. What a joke. He’d cut his hair for this role, dyed it some kind of Aryan-wet-dream blonde and shoved coloured contacts into his eyes. He looked more like the comic book version of Captain America than the real guy. It didn’t help that said Real guy had been thawed out last year. Wild times. He had a lot to live up to.
Bucky didn’t stop walking until he was outside in the fresh air. The Captain America costume was hot, restricting and heavy under the set lights. Sometimes it felt like Bucky couldn’t breathe in the thing. The helmet gave him a headache to boot.
They’ll come looking for him, they always do, he can't catch any respite. The small companies he’d worked with before, they felt more like family than this. Less about the bottom line and more about the magic they were making out of a few thousand dollars and a good eye for thrifting. But titles like Dream Date Zombie Massacre and I Married a Drag King weren’t exactly making headlines. Although both titles had cult followings, and, he'd been invited to guest at several small horror conventions for the former.
Bucky had dreamed of this though, “Major Motion Picture” his big break. The Director doesn’t let him keep his shiny packet of American Spirit cigarettes on him-- too modern, might break the continuity-- so he’s jonesing and has nothing to help. With a sigh he slides down the brick wall and bangs his head back against it once. He was a little frustrated and frustrated was not something he wanted to be on set. He wanted to get the fucking scene done. He was tired of the grit flying into his eyes and the smell of the pyrotechnics. Worst of all he was tired of the sound of the pyrotechnics. They made him jumpy and increased the pounding headache he had building behind his eyes. Practical effects were always more realistic but couldn’t they just do the damn mortars in post? They were already spending heaven knows how much time and money on blood squibs!
His thoughts turn to the ”Based on a true story” aspect of this film, and damn, was he soft! Imagine actually living this nightmare, being there in WWII, to hell with the fifty extra pounds of muscle he’d put on for the role.
It wasn’t long before he was found by a little gingery Production Assistant. He’d seen her around, looking older around the eyes than her years should have afforded. Usually, she was the one who was running back and forth getting coffee or whatever else was requested of her.
“There you are!” She exclaims, sounding relieved. Bucky wonders what she’s relieved for, the successful missing persons hunt or that she can stop looking.
He plasters a halfhearted smile on his face and looks up at her from his position on the ground. “Caught me.” He manages, not sounding too fed up with the whole thing. He stands but she puts a hand up halting his movement. Her free hand goes into her pocket.
“Here” She says, withdrawing a half-crushed pack of Camels. “I saw you smoking at the last outdoor we did.” She smiles at him, half bashful.
“Thanks.” He replies, taking one of the proffered cigarettes. She follows suit.
They’re not a minute into their impromptu cigarette break before another PA finds them and is not as nice about the whole deal. “Needed on set.” He barks gruffly.
Bucky and the gingery PA, who Bucky now knows to be named Mary, put out their cigarettes with a shared eye roll and head back to set.
The next take Bucky nails. His co-star dies and he manages running off into the distance, no (literal) slip-ups or mistakes. Bucky adds it to a growing tally of hard won successes he’s had on set thus far.
They call it for lunch and Bucky heads off to grab the day’s script. The next scene is another one with all those damned pyrotechnics, but this time there's a tank he gets to stand on and look cool. For the moment, he’s just happy to take a break and read his lines, content to pace around rehearsing.
He had a piece of bagel with a schmear of kimchi cream cheese clenched between his teeth as he paced. The cream cheese wasn’t one he was used to; in fact, the bagel was less than subpar. . . but then again he was a New York boy. Well, New York by way of Shelbyville Indiana, but he'd spent his formative years in the city. He was firmly subscribed to the notion that a bagel wasn’t a bagel without NYC tap water. The distraction of the bagel left him zoning out, eyes barely reading over the last few lines of dialogue he was supposed to be memorizing.
He counted himself as a competent thespian, not one of those people who had to call for a line every six seconds or had to have a cue card or whatever.
Lunch was nearly over and he had roughly half of his lines down. With a groan, Bucky tossed the distractingly odd snack and doubled down his efforts. His boots echoed as he paced in the steel and concrete space.
“Justice will only come when there aren’t people like you pulling the strings.” He practised, flipping the intonations and inflections on each word til he felt the line was right.
Sometimes it was hard for him to believe the lines were supposed to be based on actual things a real flesh and blood man had said. They sounded cheesier than some of the lines out of his B movies.
Out of nowhere through all the unspoken anxiety of the past few days of filming, Bucky found himself doubled over with laughter. He paced back and forth, laughing and reading his lines out like a bad 80’s cartoon superhero.
“We need to move to the left flank, Hydra must be stopped.” He said, with his voice lowered and his hand on his hip, only to devolve into a heap of laughter a second later.
When he was called back on set he found it much easier to deliver his lines and the rest of the day went smoothly. He could safely say that for the most part any retakes weren’t a result of him fucking it up.
After that day it became a routine for Bucky to go into some secluded, dark corner and make fun of the script. Like every red blooded American kid he had been obsessed with Captain America at some point in his youth, and as far as he was concerned, that cartoon caricature from the comic books was who Steve Rogers was. Or. . . Is. Whatever. It was easier make-believing that fact was still true, that he wasn’t portraying a real person, just a cartoon. To prepare for the role, Bucky had watched all the old film reels and the earlier movies about the man’s life. Hell, it seemed like they hadn’t let the man cool in his grave-- no ice pun intended-- before they were making biopics about Steve Rogers. The earliest one was from the forties, most recent was from ten years ago. It was going to seem like they were all jumping on the Captain America bandwagon now that Cap was somehow alive and well in the 21st century. This wasn’t the case, Bucky had been prepping for filming a month and a half before it was announced that Captain America had been found alive. Oh well, all he cared about was giving a good performance as the titular character.
For a while, his secret routine worked well, he’d force down whatever weird Californian concoction he’d picked to eat and make fun of the daily script.
The only thing he had to complain about now was the monotony of closed sets. He’d thought there’d be more on location shots than there had been so far but no. In fact, today they were shooting on a very intricately crafted and constructed replica of a war-torn French street. It was exact, right down to the horse shit on the sidewalk. He knew they were flying out to some remote place that apparently looked enough like eastern Europe to stay within budget sometime within the week. Apparently, they’d blown too much of the money already on cgi and practical pyrotechnics. Not that Bucky could blame them, the effects were amazing and the real tanks were something to behold. Thank goodness for war memorabilia collectors eh? There had been an elderly man in SoCal who had a whole lot filled with old tanks and trucks that had seen battle directly and were restored to pristine condition by the old man’s loving devotion to memory. Of course, loving devotion was nothing compared to dollar signs these days.
Bucky read his lines and let himself be directed, schooled his expression to one he himself called “Patriotic Stoicism” That unflappable visage copied from wartime posters of Captain America himself. Though if Bucky were being honest most of the actual press photos had the man looking awkward and unsure of himself as he held babies and did all the other bullshit required of a Hero.
More than once, Bucky’s found himself snorting a laugh at the old newsreels of Cap in a crowd of people. He found himself growing a kind of detached fondness for the man in the reels. But hey, his performance was improving so nobody could complain. He was better now, at the whole “Captain America” voice and everything, which, he found, wasn’t exactly a superhero cartoon impersonation after all.
There was not a day that went by that he wasn’t doing some dumb thing off set to let his nerves loose and warm up. It had started with the voices and had evolved into him posing like the war bonds posters and everything. Bucky would flex his newly hewn muscles and stand on shipping crates like they were the tanks and read out the script.
“This is the last Hydra base in the area, boys. Forward!” He shouted, making an explosion noise with his mouth. BLAM! ARGH! He tucked and rolled off the crate to a standing position and posed with the shield, bringing it up like he was defending himself from some invisible force in front of him. It wasn’t scripted but Bucky acted like he’d taken a shot and fell to his knees, hamming up dying on the floor like a kid doing some make-believe game.
He was just devolving into a fit of uncontrollable laughter when someone behind him cleared their throat.
“Ahem, Bucky.”
Bucky tensed immediately, choking off his laughter, when he recognized the Director’s voice. Like a kid caught doing something wrong, he stood and brushed his costume off.
“I uh. . . “ he began sheepishly with his head low.
“So, this is where you sneak off to every day?” Mr Johnston asked, not unkindly as he approached his star. Truth be told he’d worked with other actors who had worse habits insofar as preparing for their roles. . . and he’d heard battle stories from other directors who worked on other sets with Hollywood elites who were, in his opinion, more eccentric than talented.
Bucky worried his lower lip with his teeth and nodded, finally swallowing his pride and looking up at the director. “Need me on set eh?” he managed to sound nonchalant, like he wasn’t just caught acting like an eight year old on a playground.
“Actually I wanted to introduce you to our new consultant for the film. . . the producers think it’s going a little slow for their liking so they sent an expert in.” Johnston raised a hand, pointing to the dark corridor he’d just come from. Bucky now noticed that they weren’t alone, there was someone with the director. Someone tall, blonde, broad shouldered and absolutely unimpressed looking.
“That’s. . . not possible.” Bucky struggled to say, mind racing. “Him?” Bucky wasn’t sure of a lot of things in life but one thing he was now most certainly sure of. . . was that he had thoroughly embarrassed himself in front of Captain fucking America himself.
The look on the man’s face as he assessed Bucky was one of disdain to put it lightly. Bucky felt scrutinized under those blue eyes and, for the first time he felt embarrassed to be in this spangly costume. It wasn’t as though he really had anything to be embarrassed about. . . after all it was a replica of what the man in front of him wore on the battlefield. But under that gaze Bucky just felt. . . small. Unimportant. A fraud.
Regardless of his feelings, Bucky managed to perk up and look presentable. Plus one for being a decent actor.
“Yeah him. I got him by sheer luck, you can’t get a better coach in being Captain America than Captain America himself . . Get acquainted.” The director said, clapping Bucky on the shoulder and walking off.
The hand that was thrust to him a moment later from the Stoic Patriot himself may as well have been a gun for the way Bucky flinched without warning.
“Steve Rogers.” The Real Captain America said, leaving his unclaimed hand linger in the air until Bucky took it.
“Yeah, I uh, know who you are.” Bucky said as he shook hands with the super soldier, looking up at him, assessing him. Broad shoulders, a nose that obviously had taken a bad break at some point, hair a few shades darker than Bucky’s unnatural blonde and piercing blue eyes, body for days, and a short very well kempt beard. “And I’m Bucky Barnes” he said, shaking his head to clear his thoughts.
“So I’ve heard.” Steve tilted his head back to look down the bridge of his nose at Bucky. It doesn’t seem to be more unabashed scrutiny but more of an old habit. Hadn’t Steve’s eyes been bad as a kid? However, it left Bucky feeling very vulnerable, like the Gaze of Truth lay upon him, showing his soul bare.
“So uh…, Read any good books lately?” Bucky tried and failed to nervously crack a joke, standing there looking up at a living legend.
“Matter of fact, I’ve read more than my share lately.” Steve replied, crossing his arms over his huge chest. “Twilight Saga really did it for me.”
Bucky can’t tell if he’s joking until he notes the twinkle in the other man’s eye. Tension seems to dissipate and Bucky lets out a breath he didn’t know he was even holding. “Please tell me you’ve seen the movies?” He asks, smiling, some of his genuine charm seeping through.
Steve laughs, a tight self conscious thing, and his posture relaxed by microns. “I’ve seen yours.” he says, smiling sheepishly and the way he says it sends something unnamed but searing through Bucky’s gut. The feeling dries his mouth out and makes him blush.
“Mine? They’re all independent B-Movies.” He stammers and shifts on his feet.
“Good though, solid acting.” Steve’s expression turns serious like he’s some big movie exec who knows just exactly what he is supposed to be looking for when it comes to talent or the lack Thereof. His arms uncross, hands slipping into the pockets of the old-man khakis he’s wearing.
“Solid acting?” Bucky can’t help but snort. “In Granny, The Babysitter Ate The Neighbor the lead looks at the camera like fifteen times.”
Steve laughs again, this time it is more loose and rich. A moment later he lets out a breath and looks foreboding and unimpressed again. “So they think you look like me in that getup?” He asks, gesturing to the suit with his chin.
Bucky straightens his spine and squares his shoulders. “I uh, I hope so. Otherwise I cut my hair for nothing.”
“At ease, soldier” Steve says in jest and claps Bucky on the shoulder. “You got a mess hall around here? I’m dying for some coffee.”
“Captain America drinks coffee like us regular folk?” Bucky laughed as he beckoned for Steve to follow him.
Steve followed him along with a shrug. “What can I say, I like the taste. Doesn’t do much for me otherwise”
Bucky isn’t overly disappointed in the food selection of the day, vegan, gluten free salad wraps are inoffensive enough. He does, however, embarrass himself by shoving one of the springroll sized lettuce wraps all the way into his mouth, forgetting the company he’s in. He stood there with bibb lettuce hanging from his mouth for a solid ten seconds, staring in horror at Steve. To Bucky’s own shock, he doesn’t burst into flames of embarrassment, the world doesn’t end, all that happens is Steve quirking a brow at him and passing him by to grab a coffee.
The day goes almost back to normal, almost save for the fact that Bucky knows important eyes are on him. C’est la Vie.