Chapter Text
Bucky Barnes stops for the briefest of moments as the Bifrost opens behind him with a deafening roar, turning to look back over his shoulder as green lightning shoots across the battlefield. Someone with a long green cape and golden horns on their head stands in the dust stirred up by the Bifrost, and then two aliens jump off their shoulders and immediately join the fray. The stranger raises their hands and green magic shoots off in every direction, driving through outriders and throwing them in the air and slicing them in half.
Bucky turns away and pours himself into battle.
From behind him, his ears ever tuned to Steve’s voice, he hears, “Loki!”
And then he hears, in a louder and even more furious roar, “Where is Thanos?!”
Then there is thunder.
And then there is dust.
And what little family Bucky has left is gone.
Loki is detrimental at best to their recovery efforts, but something about him is interesting, draws Bucky in. He doesn’t know why, but he tends to hover near Loki whenever the god deigns to join them in their work to find Thanos and bring back those they lost. The various surviving Avengers all actively dislike him and don’t want him around, but everyone is so tired that no one directly tells him to leave. Bucky has a feeling that Loki would stay around regardless; they’re the best chance he has of getting Thor back.
Loki hasn’t told them exactly what happened to Thor, but it’s fairly clear that Thanos killed him. He glares at anyone who mentions his brother and Bucky gets it, he really does. Losing Steve made him feel like he lost a part of himself.
To Bucky’s surprise, Sam Wilson immediately takes charge. Everything that Steve would be doing, Sam does it without question, without hesitance. Bucky automatically hates him a little for trying to take Steve’s place, but he doesn’t say anything. They need all the help they can get, even from a guy who thinks he’s a bird.
They’re helpless. Bucky hates the feeling, which is why he’s still around and trying to help, although there’s nothing to do. They can’t find Thanos, they don’t know where he went, and everyone is gone.
Steve was all he had left and he’s gone. If he thinks about it too much, his throat feels like it’s going to close up and his eyes cloud over and his chest tightens and—
So he doesn’t think about it.
Loki steps forward and everyone’s eyes snap to him. They’re standing in one of the conference rooms and Sam has a screen up that’s updating with the names of the Vanished and none of them are really saying anything, still a little dumbstruck and shellshocked.
The world is so quiet now.
Sam tiredly lifts his head and his dark eyes find Loki. Neither of them say anything until Loki holds a hand out to the side, as if reaching for something, and then there’s a faint crackle in the air, as if there’s suddenly a great deal of static electricity, and Bucky’s vibranium arm even feels a little weird, and then there’s a huge axe in Loki’s hand. It’s huge, half Loki’s height, and he turns his head to look it over. Bucky shivers a little at the dark look in Loki’s eyes as the static electricity leaves the air.
“This weapon is named Stormbreaker,” Loki tells them, his voice low and quiet. He has a bit of a strange accent, almost like he heard a stereotyped British accent a few decades or centuries ago and decided to take it on as an affectation. Bucky searched the Avengers file database for information on him a few days after the Snap and spent a while reading up on him. He’s heard people call it the Decimation, and that feels more accurate to how he feels.
Loki is still talking. Bucky’s mind has been more Swiss-cheese than usual lately. “We name our weapons,” Loki continues, “to give them history and meaning and a purpose. We bind spells to them, we spill our blood over them, we tie ourselves to them.” He lifts the axe and licks his lips, blinks a few times. “The creation of this weapon was Thor’s last act.” No one says anything, eyes locked on Loki, who doesn’t look at any of them. “He tied the Bifrost to this weapon. I can wield it.”
Then he looks to Sam, who nods. “You’re saying you can take us where we need to go if we find Thanos?”
“When Thanos is found, I will take you to him, and I will kill him.”
Sam leans back in his chair, looks around the room at the rest of them. Bucky glowers at him for the brief moment Sam meets his gaze. Rhodes is in a wheelchair on the other side of the table and he and Sam share a long, significant look before Sam lets out a sigh and nods.
Natasha Romanoff, who has stayed as silent and determined as Sam, although she’s had a vague, punched-out look about her in the past few days since she got a phone call from Hawkeye, turns in her chair to look at Loki, who stares back at her. Bucky had watched the security cam footage of the two of them on the Helicarrier and wonders what she thinks about Loki now, over half a decade later.
“You’ll kill him?” Natasha asks, her voice low. They’ve all been quiet since the Snap, as if volume will break the tremulous peace that’s descended over them since they decided to go after Thanos.
“You weren’t able to last time,” Rhodes speaks up, Loki’s sharp green eyes sliding across the room to pin him in place. “Just saying.”
Loki’s hand tightens around Stormbreaker’s shaft until his knuckles are white. His mouth thins and his eyes narrow. Bucky has seen a lot of dangerous men in his life—and he is one—but his hands curl into fists at his sides and his body automatically tenses in preparation for whatever is going to happen next; Loki is a bomb ready to go off. He’s more dangerous than anyone Bucky has ever met, Bucky is certain of it.
“I will rend his flesh from his bones,” Loki hisses. “Thanos’s win is not solely on my shoulders. I noticed that your lot did not manage to kill him either, and there are far more of you than me.”
Rhodes’ chin raises. “You’re a god, right? God can’t kill another god?”
Sam holds up a hand to stop them before they get any further. “Loki, we appreciate the help.” He pauses for a moment and glances at Bucky before saying, “I’m sorry about Thor.”
That shocks Loki, as well as Natasha and Rhodes, who both turn to look at him, eyes a bit wide. Loki finally lowers Stormbreaker to the floor with a loud thunk, eyes locked on Sam, who looks solemnly back at him.
“We all lost people,” Sam continues. “Right now, that’s what’s important. We have to stick together, regardless of who we are and what we’ve done.” To Bucky’s surprise, Sam doesn’t look at him while he says that. “So, if you can help, Loki, I’m happy for it. Tell me what you got.”
He waves Loki forward, who doesn’t move for a long moment and then takes one slow, halting step forward. Loki does something with his hand and Stormbreaker disappears, that strange static feeling shooting around the room for a few seconds before disappearing. Loki brings up both hands and rests them on the back of the nearest empty chair, fingers digging into the fabric.
Loki takes in a deep breath. “What work do your...scientists do to find Thanos?”
“Banner is working with the Wakandan scientists, what few of them are left, and Shuri on tracking any energy signatures from using the Infinity Stones again, as well as trying to find Stark. The energy blast from using the Gauntlet was huge and it’ll easily be tracked if he uses them again,” Natasha speaks up, not looking at Loki. Bucky moves a little closer, curious about what’s going to happen.
“How successful have they been?” Loki asks.
Natasha sighs. They’ve all been sighing a lot. “They haven’t,” she says.
“They’re searching day and night finding nada,” Rhodes adds on. “No way we can find him until he uses the Gauntlet again.”
Loki nods, delicately clears his throat. His gaze drops down to the table and he takes a deep breath.
After he speaks, Natasha stands up and throws one of the heavy coasters through one of the massive floor-length windows on the far side of the room.
Barton agrees, shocking everyone. Bucky overheard him tell Natasha that he’s more pissed at Thanos than he is at Loki, which is saying a lot, which is why he doesn’t argue and submits to Loki’s intrusion.
Of course, none of them are comfortable with Loki being alone in a room with any of them, especially Barton, so Sam, Natasha, Rhodes, Banner, a few Dora Milaje, and Bucky are all scattered around the room.
Bucky thinks about Shuri deprogramming him while he watches Loki. Loki is meditating, floating over top of a table, eyes closed and legs crossed. He looks calm and unbothered by the people talking quietly around him, although Bucky has a feeling that Loki could kill them all without thinking about it if he felt so inclined.
Sam steps up next to him, arms crossed over his chest. He looks tired. They’re all tired. “If you don’t want to stick around for this,” Sam mutters, “you don’t need to.”
Bucky frowns, sends him a confused look. “You kickin’ me out?”
“No,” Sam chuckles. “We need to stick together. I just figured, the whole brain thing and all…” He trails off, sends Bucky a mildly concerned look. Bucky’s frown deepens and he doesn’t quite know what to say.
Is Sam worried about him? Worried that this might, what, make the Winter Soldier resurface? He’s free of the brainwashing, they made sure of that, he would rather be dead than—
“Might be triggering,” Sam finally says, not looking at him. “Don’t need to heap any more trauma on you.”
“Oh,” Bucky murmurs, blinking in shock. He’d meant it...oh. “No, it’s fine.”
Sam nods. “Alright. Just let me know if it’s not.” He sends Bucky a sharp smile. “Don’t need you freakin’ out on me, man.”
Bucky tries to chuckle at that, surprises himself when he actually does. “I’ll aim for you if it happens,” he shoots back.
Sam laughs at that, but before he can say anything, Loki’s eyes open and the room falls immediately, eerily silent. Barton is sitting in an armchair in the middle of the room, and he’s had a vacant, traumatized look on his face ever since he arrived the day before in a Wakandan jet. But when Loki’s attention turns to him, that look fades away, replaced by stubborn determination.
Bucky and Sam step forward at the same time as Loki floats forward, unfolding his legs and silently lowering himself to the floor, looking down at Barton. His eyes are blindly green, bright and almost glowing, and then he smiles as he reaches out a hand to press his fingers to Barton’s forehead. Both of them take in a sharp breath and their eyes shut simultaneously.
Bucky was expecting that strange static energy to appear, but instead there’s nothing. It’s quiet as they watch Loki and Barton in the middle of the room, nothing in particular seeming to happen.
Sam clears his throat. “Was this what it was like for you?” he asks, not looking at Bucky, who snorts.
“Think there was more screaming,” Bucky says finally, not entirely sure what to say. He pauses, thinks about the recovered security cam footage of Loki pressing a scepter to Barton’s chest that he watched with a hand over his mouth, and then says, “It’s hard regardless.”
Sam nods, doesn’t say anything. Bucky has a feeling he was trying to make a joke and Bucky took it seriously and there’s a sinking feeling in his stomach that he tries to push away. Instead he thinks about willingly subjecting himself to HYDRA scientists again in order to maybe save the world and it feels like his spine is going to try and crawl out of his throat.
Loki had said that he was connected to two of the Infinity Stones, the Tesseract and the Mind Stone. He wielded both of them and had already attempted to seek out the Tesseract through his past bond to it, but had been unsuccessful. He had some idea of where in the galaxy the Space Stone was, but it would take years, if not decades or even longer, to narrow down Thanos’s location. Then he had said he had also used the Mind Stone and it was linked to him, but his connection to the Stone would be stronger if he also sought for the Stone using another mind that had been bound to him through the Mind Stone. That’s when Natasha had thrown the coaster.
Ultimately, they’d talked about it every which way and it had been Sam who decided to just ask Barton. They weren’t going to track down any of the SHIELD agents that Loki had brainwashed, and Barton was already on his way to Wakanda, so it was easiest to just ask him. Barton had stumbled off the Quinjet, eyes bloodshot and horror-wrought, and he and Natasha had collapsed in each other’s arms, curling together tightly enough that it seemed like they were trying to meld together. Then she’d said something and he’d turned and thrown up into the grass.
He’d agreed, though, in the end. Loki hadn’t even been around; Sam had thought he would’ve exacerbated the situation and had banned him from the conversation with Barton while they explained everything. It hadn’t even taken long.
Bucky had kind of wanted him to turn Loki down, make him find something else, another way, but Barton had agreed.
He can’t stop thinking about what it would take to agree to something like that. He’s been thinking about it for the past day, thinking about what he would do in Barton’s shoes—if his only choice to save the world was to let HYDRA back in his head, would he be able to do it?
Barton had lost everything, Sam had said. His wife, his kids. Everything. But Bucky had lost his family as well; he was alone. Would he let HYDRA back in to save Steve? Even for just the chance?
The thought makes him want to vomit, but he swallows it back down. There must be a nauseated look on his face, however, because when Sam glances back at him again, his face twists in concern. He even reaches out and puts a hand on Bucky’s shoulder. Bucky lets him for a moment and then twists away; sometimes being touched makes him feel like he has ants crawling over his skin. That sensation doesn’t come but Sam doesn’t reach out for him again, just looking at him, brow furrowed.
“You alright, man?”
Bucky swallows. “’m fine,” he mutters, glancing past Sam to see Barton slumped forward, eyes somehow open, locked on Loki’s face, supported only by Loki’s hand on his forehead. Bucky watches for a long moment and then turns away, thinking about being subjected to the Chair and feeling his mind fracture and break, thinking about his memories causing him pain.
But then, of course, it’s over, as Barton takes in a huge, gasping breath and throws himself back, staring up at Loki like he’s a bomb about to go off, hyperventilating as he tries to breathe. Everyone takes a step forward, cautious, and then Loki lowers his hand and opens his eyes and smiles.
“I know where he is,” he says, and reaches out through time and space for Stormbreaker, which appears in his hand. He turns to look at Sam, eyebrows raised. “Well?”
“Go get ready,” Sam tells everyone, eyes locked on Loki. “You, stay here. Everyone else, go suit up. Meet out front in 20.”
Bucky wants to stay behind and listen to what Sam says to Loki, but he’s too nauseous and worried about Barton, so he follows the Avengers out of the room, watching Barton lean on Natasha, one of her arms around his waist. He looks back as the door closes behind him and sees Sam standing in front of Loki, arms crossed over his chest, and Loki is, of course, smiling. It makes Bucky shiver with something that he doesn’t recognize and he turns away, jogging a bit to catch up with Barton.
“You alright, man?” he finally gets out, wincing at himself with how stupid that sounds. “I, uh, I don’t think I could do it.”
Barton stops and turns back to look at him, frowning.
“If I had to go back to them. HYDRA.”
It’s just the three of them in the hallway, and Barton straightens up meeting Bucky’s gaze. He’s shorter than Bucky thought he was. “Nat, go get my bow for me, would you?” he asks, not looking away from Bucky.
Natasha sighs, elbows Barton in the side, but walks off, leaving them alone. Barton winces as he rubs a hand over his forehead. “Hell are you talkin’ about, Barnes?” he asks finally.
“I was thinking that if I had to go back to HYDRA to try and save the world, I couldn’t do it. Even to save…” Bucky trails off, swallows, finally grinds out, “Steve.” Even just saying his name makes him feel light-headed with loss.
Barton nods. “Yeah, alright,” he sighs, looking back up at Bucky. “You lost Cap, right? Steve?” Bucky nods slowly. “Either it’s this or I take myself out with them. I get that what you went through was worse, but those two weeks were the worst weeks of my life.”
“I wasn’t trying to say that—”
“No, I didn’t mean that,” Barton interrupts. “Bad choice of words. Been a little distracted lately,” he snorts, a wry grin twisting his mouth, and Bucky finds himself smiling a little in return. “When Loki had me, those were the worst two weeks of my life. I’d give him the rest of my life if he helped me find my family again.”
“Is that what you did?” Bucky blurts, unable to stop himself.
“No. He doesn’t want that.” Barton checks his watch and starts to turn away to go change out of his civilian clothes and into his Hawkeye gear.
“What does he want?”
“His brother back.”
Bucky watches him walk off and doesn’t say anything. He wants to know more, wants to know how it felt, how different it was to what HYDRA did to him, what it was even like, but Barton is already around a corner and Bucky doesn’t have a way with words like Steve does, or even Sam. He’s kind of the perpetual sidekick, what can he say.
He grimaces at that, and then damn near jumps out of his skin when Loki’s voice comes from behind him, “I thought it was only your arm that was robotic. Did your entire body freeze up, perhaps?”
“Was that a joke?” Bucky asks without thinking about it, turning around to look at the god in shock.
“I have been known to make them on occasion,” Loki drawls. He’s now wearing the same outfit he arrived in Wakanda, with a huge gold horned helm and a long green cape and black and green leather, and he has Stormbreaker in one hand. While Bucky is looking at him, he brings the huge axe forward and sets it on the floor, clasping his hands on top of the massive head. It looks a little out of place with him, but he manages to make it work. From what little Bucky knows of Thor, it’s definitely a Thor weapon. Loki then gestures vaguely towards Bucky with a little wave of his fingers. “I see that your mind has been healed.”
“You see that?” Bucky asks, taking an automatic step back.
Loki rolls his eyes. “You’re not a half-feral killing machine any longer, are you not? So yes, I see it.”
He swallows, grits his teeth, raises his jaw. “They talked about sending me after you, you know,” he says. “But didn’t want to play their hand that early.”
Loki casts him a dismissive look. “Even an enhanced human is no real match against an Aesir,” he says, somehow managing to sound both smug and bored at the same time.
“Didn’t Steve beat your ass once?”
Loki’s mouth curls into a smile that’s somehow all teeth. But before he can reply, Sam’s voice comes from behind him. “No,” Sam says, “we’re not doing this. We’re a team now.” Bucky raises his hands defensively, doesn’t say anything. “Go get changed, Bucky. We’re leaving in 10 minutes.” Sam comes around Loki and glares at him until Bucky shrugs at him and walks off to go put on his own leather shirt and tac pants and find a pair of boots.
“No antagonizing the other Avengers,” Bucky hears Sam sigh as he turns the corner, and it makes him pause for the barest moment. Is he an Avenger?
There’s no way, right?
He scoffs mentally at that. Definitely no way.
They get sidetracked for the afternoon by the appearance of Carol Danvers, who is probably the coolest and most badass person Bucky has ever met, but they manage to get to Thanos’ Garden as the two suns there are beginning to set. If Bucky wasn’t so sickenly pissed off, he would think it pretty.
Loki is a force unto his own. He ignores Sam and Natasha trying to get them to make a plan of attack and instead shoves past them, static electricity bouncing off him, and Bucky’s eyes drop to Stormbreaker in his hand, actual lightning rolling down the shaft of the axe. He exchanges a wide-eyed look with Sam, then they both rush after Loki.
They all follow behind the god as he makes his way towards the lone, crude cabin on the hill. Thanos is sitting outside on a flight of rough-hewn stone steps, apparently waiting for them. His left arm is withered and blackened and tied to his chest with a cloth.
Thanos smiles, even laughs a little. “So you come, back to me,” he says, and Loki does not give him another chance to speak, suddenly leaping high up into the air, green lightning shooting down from the sky and then following him back up, a deafening boom of thunder, and it’s over in barely a moment as Loki chops off his head.
The raccoon, who is apparently named Rocket, snorts and rushes after Thanos’ head. Bucky, more intrigued than he would like to admit, follows him, wondering what he’s going to do. Everyone seems stunned and then Loki lets out a furious roar, bringing Stormbreaker back up again to cut Thanos’ arm off. He throws the axe to the side, green magic surrounding his hands as he yanks the blackened and twisted Infinity Gauntlet off Thanos’ dead hand.
Sam realizes what he’s going to do first, rushing forward to try and stop him, but Loki ignores him. “You can’t do this,” Sam tells him, buffeted back by the green magic surrounding Loki. “You can’t use it, Loki, it’ll kill you.”
“Then it kills me,” Loki grits out, stuffing his hand into the blackened and twisted Gauntlet. His head swings around, looking over them with a wild, mad gaze, and then he closes his eyes, raises the Gauntlet up, and Snaps.
Nothing happens.
When Thanos Snapped, the reverberation of all that energy echoing throughout the galaxy threw Bucky off his feet. He was thrown down into the dirt and heard Steve say his name before he suddenly disappeared in a cloud of black dust, and Bucky had thrown himself forward, digging his hands into the dust and the dirt, uncomprehending of what he was seeing. Then Sam had rushed forward, staring at the same spot Bucky couldn’t look away from, and he’d fallen to his knees next to Bucky. The two of them had leaned on each other in those long, horrible moments in which the entire world had come crashing down on top of them.
Sam had gotten up first. Bucky will never forget that. Sam had leaned on him and had let Bucky lean on him in return, and Sam had pushed to his feet first, and then offered Bucky a hand. Bucky had taken it and the two of them had stood there for a long moment, hand in hand, before Sam pulled away and said something about needing to find out what happened, even though it had been crystal, painfully clear. Maybe it’s not such a surprise that Sam has taken up everything Steve would do, after all.
But when Loki uses the Gauntlet, nothing happens.
He tries again, again and again, and nothing. He finally lets out a shriek of rage and rips the Gauntlet off his hand and throws it to the ground, chest heaving, that strange static electricity in the air again.
Back near Sam, Barton sighs. “Fuck,” he says, sliding the arrow in his hand back into his quiver and clipping his bow onto his back. He glances at Natasha, who frowns at him. “Fuck,” he says again, and begins to walk forward.
“Clint, don’t,” Natasha tries, but he dodges her outstretched hand and moves faster towards Loki.
Rhodes apparently decides he’s done with them and walks past everyone and goes into Thanos’ hut, Carol following him. Bucky glances at Rocket, who is examining Thanos’ cut off head, and he groans to himself, looking back at Sam.
“Why didn’t the Gauntlet work?” Bucky asks before anyone else says anything. It seems to catch Loki a little off guard, as he stops whatever huge magical blast he was preparing and he frowns. “Are the Stones still in it?”
Loki floats the Gauntlet up into the air, turning it over. The answer is clear before he says anything, the setting sun glinting off the six Infinity Stones embedded in the blackened gold. “Yes,” he says, brow furrowed. “I have never had an Infinity Stone refuse to work.”
“Well, the Stones were put there by Thanos, right?” Natasha speaks up, looking annoyed about it. “Maybe they only work for him.”
Loki scowls at that. “Perhaps,” he mutters, clearly not wanting to agree with her. But then he smiles. “Would you be willing to try?”
“Not on your life,” Natasha scoffs.
“He wasn’t talking to you,” Barton sighs, moving forward again until he’s standing right in front of Loki. Bucky frowns and glances at Sam, who is watching Rocket do whatever insane thing he’s doing with Thanos’ head, so Bucky steps closer as well. Loki is standing next to Thanos’s headless corpse, which is a little gross, but Bucky has seen a lot grosser, so he doesn’t say anything.
Before Barton can do anything stupid, Bucky tries, “Maybe it’s a fake Gauntlet? He might’ve known we were going to come after him and prepared.”
Loki’s brow furrows and he turns the Gauntlet over in his hands. Finally he shakes his head. “Each Infinity Stone has a very specific feeling,” he says. “No, these are Infinity Stones.”
“So what the hell does this mean, then? We can’t bring everyone back?” Barton growls out. “What was the point of all this, then? You killed him before we even had a chance to—”
“You know as well as I do that there would have been no conversation,” Loki barks out, Barton falling silent. Sam steps up next to Bucky, a worried look on his face. “Would you have me bring him back to life so we can ask?”
“You can do that?” Sam asks.
Loki scoffs. “His body is still warm; mere minutes have passed. His soul surely still lingers. It would be difficult magic to be certain, but not impossible.”
“You’re not going to bring him back to life,” Sam finally says, pinching the bridge of his nose in between two fingers for a long moment. “No, I know you’re capable. I’m not condoning necromancy. What’s done is done. Get the Gauntlet and we’ll bring it back to Wakanda. Have them look at it there. Someone will know what to do.”
Carol and Rhodes come out of the hut. “You might want to take a look at this, Sam,” Rhodes calls, and Bucky follows Sam over, briefly watching the silent argument taking place between Barton and Natasha. Loki stays put, evidently uninterested in anything other than the mangled Gauntlet in his hands.
The hut is surprisingly tidy, and a bit bigger than Bucky was expecting. It’s spartan, with a mussed cot in one corner and a cooking area on the other end, as well as a table and a few books. The books are open and Carol is reading one of them, a troubled look on her face.
“What is it?” Sam asks.
“He put in safeguards,” Carol says, turning a page. “This is ancient Kree writing about the Infinity Stones. The only thing powerful enough to stop or change an Infinity Stone is another Infinity Stone.” She sighs, puts the book down. “I think he used the Gauntlet to render the Stones inert.”
Sam takes a step back in shock, shaking his head. “How is that possible?” he asks, voice faint.
“Should’ve killed him,” Carol says, attention back on the book. “Maybe that’s why Loki was able to take him down so quickly. Probably didn’t have any fight left in him.”
“This is Thanos we’re talking about,” Rhodes says. “All he is is fight.”
“Until he achieved his goal,” Carol replies. “He did it. Half of life in all the universe, every star in the galaxy. If he did this...there’s no way of getting them back.”
Bucky squeezes his eyes shut at the thought. Steve was all he had left. His brother, his best friend...and he’s gone? Just like that?
A warm hand slides over his shoulders and Bucky doesn’t jump away from it; he knows it’s Sam and he turns towards him even though his entire soul is telling him to run. “He can’t be gone,” Bucky rasps out roughly, eyes opening to look at Sam, who nods, not saying anything. “There has to be something we can do.”
Barton and Natasha enter the hut, followed soon by Loki and Rocket, who strapped Thanos’s head to his back and is apparently going to keep it. Good for him, Bucky supposes. Loki glances around and zeros in on the books, pushing past Sam and Bucky, who quickly pull apart, to pick up one of the books and glance through it.
“Ah,” Loki says, a frown on his face. “I see.”
“Yeah,” Carol says, showing him what she’s reading. “I don’t think we got these energy readings but I definitely think he did something.”
Loki carelessly drops the book to the table and holds up the Gauntlet again. “I can still sense the power of the Infinity Stones within this,” he says, turning the Gauntlet over in his hands, brow furrowed. “Perhaps they are lessened, but I cannot be certain as of yet.”
Barton steps up next to him and holds out a hand. Loki doesn’t hesitate to hand the Gauntlet over, raising his eyebrows at Barton as he rests his palm over the yellow Mind Stone. “It might be less than it was before,” Barton says slowly, “but you’d have to use it to be sure.” He pulled his hand back and ran his fingers over the Stones embedded in the blackened, twisted Gauntlet. “Shouldn’t this feel like a black hole?” He turns his head, looks up at Loki. “The Scepter felt like a black hole, and that was just one of them.”
“You wielded the Scepter?” Sam asks, Natasha echoing him a moment later.
“Something like that,” Barton shrugs, tossing the Gauntlet up into the air before catching it again and then handing it over to Loki, who suddenly seems profoundly bored with the conversation. Loki glances around the hut and his eyes linger on Bucky for a long moment before he sweeps out of the hut, tension immediately easing out of the air once he’s gone.
“You never told me about that,” Natasha says to Barton, her voice quiet. He shrugs one shoulder and doesn’t answer her. Bucky looks away from them and to Carol and Rhodes, who are packing up the various books into Rhodes’ War Machine suit, and then to Sam, who is shaking his head and rubbing a hand over his forehead.
“Looks like we’re done here,” Sam sighs. “Unless anyone sees something for us to do?”
“No, think we’re good,” Carol agrees after poking around the tiny cooking area. She leads the way out of the hut, Barton and Natasha staying behind for a few minutes, and they all gather in a straggled circle around Thanos’ corpse.
“Guess we should...burn him?” Rhodes finally offers up.
“Throw him into a sun,” Rocket mutters, sliding forward to pat the corpse down to see if he has anything in his pockets. Bucky snorts and Sam opens his mouth to tell Rocket to stop but thinks better of himself.
Loki comes back from whatever he was doing near the planted alien plants and he does something with the Gauntlet that he makes it disappear into the air next to him. They all look around the alien planet for a few minutes and decide to go home; there’s nothing left for them to do. They leave Thanos to rot.
Loki opens the Bifrost and the journey back to Wakanda is quick and painless. They file back inside the palace silently, all going to their separate rooms without talking much. Bucky, unsure what to do, follows Sam, who doesn’t say anything until they get back to Sam’s room and Sam drops to the couch and puts his head in his hands.
Bucky hovers awkwardly next to the couch and then slowly sits next to him, putting a hand on Sam’s shoulder when he starts shaking and heaving, not trying to hide his crying.
“What the hell are we supposed to do?” Sam asks, his voice teary. “They’re gone.”
Bucky nods, tries to find the words. Finally he tries, “We’ll figure something out.”
Sam shakes his head, doesn’t say anything. Bucky leans against the back of the couch and stares sightlessly up at the ceiling. He squeezes his eyes shut, feeling tears leak out and slide down his cheeks.
“I miss him,” Bucky whispers. Sam’s hand lands on his leg and Bucky lets out a hitching, gasping breath. “I don’t know what to do, Sam.”
His hand slides down Sam’s arm and Sam grabs it, intertwining their fingers, holding on tight. “We’ll do our best,” Sam finally says. “That’s all we can do.”
Bucky sighs, nods. “If you say so,” he tries to tease, and Sam chuckles at him, wiping his free hand over his face. He keeps his eyes on the ceiling as he thinks. At least he’s not truly alone. If he had to choose anyone to live through the end of the world with, and Steve is gone, then he’ll take Sam. Not like the two of them like each other, but Sam is so much like Steve sometimes that it makes Bucky’s heart hurt a little.
He squeezes Sam’s hand and prays for sunrise.