fic: Say Good Morning to the Night (MCU/DCU; Bucky/Steph; pg)
Yeah, so apparently I wrote 4100 words of Bucky Barnes/Stephanie Brown. I don't even know. Stupid formerly dead sidekicks.
Say Good Morning to the Night
Captain America (2011)/Batgirl (comic); Steph/Bucky; pg; 4,170 words
"If you're old news, doll, then I'm history."
Pre-reboot, obviously.
Title from "Mona Lisas and Mad Hatters" by Elton John.
~*~
Say Good Morning to the Night
Bucky hates working in Gotham, but Sitwell swears the Bats are all out of town--the big guy is off on some JLA mission, Red Robin's in San Francisco with the Titans, and Nightwing is back in Bludhaven these days and allegedly keeping the littlest Robin out of trouble--so he sets up on the roof of a warehouse across from the docks and waits for the freighter carrying the stolen Phase 2 weapons to arrive.
His left hip has just started to twinge from the chill and the damp when the boat eases into the harbor. He breathes in slowly, centered and focused, but before he can draw a bead on the thugs moving around on deck, he's distracted by something moving in his peripheral vision.
A girl with long blonde hair and a yellow bat on her chest flings a batarang at his gun and says, "In Gotham, the good guys don't use guns."
The batarang explodes on impact and coats his rifle in some kind of gelatinous goop that is going to be hell to clean up, and only his quick reflexes ensure that he's not covered in it himself. "What the hell?"
She uses his shoulder to cartwheel into a series of flips that take her over to the next roof. "Tag! You're it!"
He launches himself after her, muttering, "I am too old for this shit." Her laughter floats back to him as she descends to the dock and kicks over two of the goons unloading the freighter, and he suddenly remembers what that was like--the simple joy of punching bad guys in the face--with a sharpness that takes his breath away for a moment.
The girl--Batgirl, he supposes, and he wonders why Sitwell didn't know there was a new one in town--is good, but he doesn't take the time to admire her, not when there are thugs to take down.
She's breathing hard by the time they're done and there's a long gash on her forearm that looks like it stings, but she's zip-tying the goons like she doesn't even feel it, and with the adrenaline rush from the fight, he figures she probably doesn't.
"I think this one is mine," he says, nudging Radnovic's prone form with the toe of his boot. Sirens start wailing in the distance, and he'd like to be gone before they arrive.
Batgirl holds up a gloved finger. "One moment, please." She cocks her head, obviously listening to someone on comms, and then says, "You can sort out jurisdiction with the GCPD, but you can't kill him." He opens his mouth but she shakes her head. "You know the rules, and they don't change just because the big guy's not here right now."
The sirens are getting closer now, and he resigns himself to a long night of arguing with local law enforcement and filling out paperwork.
"That's my cue to leave," she says, "but you should leave the guns at home and visit more often. Maybe next time, we can go for waffles." And she winks at him before she takes off, running a few steps before her grapple gun swings her up into the cloudy Gotham sky.
In spite of himself, Bucky grins, because a pretty girl winking at him never gets old, and the thought of Batgirl and waffles keeps him from growling too much at the cops and Sitwell while they sort out who's going to take charge of Radnovic and his thugs.
After that's done and they're on their way back to New York, Bucky says, "Is there a reason you didn't mention Batgirl in your Bat roundup?"
"We didn't know there was a new one." Sitwell frowns. "The Batman is not exactly forthcoming with SHIELD about his operations."
Bucky grunts noncommittally. Gotham is usually a no-go zone for them, and the rare times they do need to go there, they're supposed to give the Bat advance notice. Bucky knows how that galls Fury, and he knows that Steve and Bruce--uneasy allies at the best of times--have argued about it more than once. He tries not to get involved in those disputes; he keeps his head down and shoots where he's aimed so nobody decides that having a formerly brainwashed Soviet assassin running around loose is a bad idea.
The encounter is enough to make him agree to take another assignment in Gotham a few weeks later, though. He spends most of the night waiting for the club to empty out so he can place the bugs in Cobblepot's office. It's boring but easy, the kind of mission he'd usually complain about because it's a waste of his talents, but he's always had a weakness for waffles, and for girls who are good in a fight. It's not until he's installing a camera over the back door that Batgirl finds him.
"I thought you'd be stealthier," she says, crossing her arms over her chest.
He doesn't flinch. He's been expecting company, and pretending not to hope it'd be her. "You knew I was going to be here."
"Well, yes," she says, giving him a bright smile, "but you didn't know I would be here."
"I was hoping," he answers before he can think better of it.
"Flattery will get you--Well, it'll get you waffles, anyway."
His mouth curves in a half-grin. "Waffles?"
"Gotham City Diner, three blocks down, make a left on Adams." Another one of those white phosphorous smiles. "Fifteen minutes. Be there or be square."
He finds himself smiling in response as she disappears over the edge of the roof with a flare of her cape.
He grabs his jacket off his bike and gets there in ten. He watches a blonde girl in black yoga pants and a purple hoodie slide into a booth and chat with a waitress. He pulls the jacket on, shoves his domino into his pocket, and takes a deep breath. He used to be good at this, a million years and a thousand dead bodies ago.
He slips into the booth across from her and is greeted by another bright smile. "You made it! Early, even. Nice touch."
"I'm not one to make a lady wait."
"I appreciate that," she says.
The waitress comes back, pours coffee for both of them and offers Bucky a menu. "The usual?" she asks Batgirl.
"Yes, please."
The waitress turns to Bucky, who looks at Batgirl. "Is 'the usual' waffles?"
"Of course. With a side of bacon and some home fries."
Bucky hands the unused menu back to the waitress. "I'll have what she's having."
Batgirl grins at him over the rim of her coffee cup and he takes a moment to really look at her. She's younger than he expected, but not young enough to make him feel like a creep.
"Do I have something on my face?" she asks, and he realizes he's been staring too long.
"No, no, you look great. I just wasn't expecting--"
"You thought it would be masks on all the way."
"You guys have that reputation."
She nods. "Tried that once. Didn't end well."
"Oh."
"Yeah." She looks thoughtful and kind of sad, and he realizes he wants to see her smile again.
"So that thing you used on my rifle--"
"The gooperang," she says, brightening. "Cool, right?"
"Only because you didn't have to spend an hour cleaning it up."
She shrugs an unsympathetic shoulder. "You know the rules."
He doesn't tell her how SHIELD plays fast and loose with rules when they think it's necessary. How he's never been one to follow them either. "Yeah, but how'd you know I was a good guy?"
"What else would you be, wearing that?" She nods at his left shoulder, even though it's covered by his jacket now. "It's easy to say they're just symbols and their only purpose is to look cool, but we both know it's more than that. They mean something." He wants to call her naïve, because it might mean something to him (and to her), but anyone could exploit it if they really wanted to, and there's nothing Steve (or any of them) could do about it. It must show on his face, because she adds, "And besides, I know who you are."
"Really?"
"Yeah. I think everybody in our line of work knows who you are."
Unfortunately, that's probably true (and most of that is not, sadly, because of Steve), but he doesn't comment on it, or he'll just end up ranting. Instead, he asks, "And do I get to return the favor?"
The food arrives then, and they busy themselves with butter and syrup and ketchup on the home fries. He lets it go--he can find out easily enough, though it stings a little that she won't tell him.
"Steph," she says after she's devoured her waffle and bacon. She's pushing what's left of her home fries through a blob of ketchup. "I'm Steph."
"So, why's a pretty girl like you put on the cowl?"
She rests her knife and fork on her mostly empty plate and leans back, head cocked thoughtfully. "My dad was the Cluemaster."
"I don't know who that is."
"S'okay, not a lot of people do. He was kind of smalltime, but I wanted to stop him and I couldn't get Batman's attention. So I decided to do it myself."
"And one thing led to another?"
Her mouth curves ruefully, and her eyes are sort of faraway, like she's remembering something. "Yeah, something like that." She leans forward again, elbows on the table, twining her fingers and resting her chin on her hands. "What about you?"
"You know who I am."
"I know your name, and I've read the comics," she says, "but that's not," she waves a hand, "you."
His phone is buzzing in his pocket, so he says, "We don't have time for that today, but we should do this again sometime. Soon."
She grins again. "I'd like that." Her phone chimes then and her eyes widen in surprise. "Crap. I didn't realize it was so late." She pulls money out of somewhere and tosses it on the table. "That should cover mine, plus tax and tip. I've gotta run." She slides out of the booth, takes two steps, and comes back.
"Steph?"
"I had a really nice time," she says, leaning down and giving him a quick kiss. And then she's gone.
"Me, too," he mutters and grins at the waitress when she drops off the check.
After that, he makes it a point to volunteer for their rare missions in Gotham, so he can see her again.
It does not go unnoticed.
*
Natasha finds him on the shooting range. She leans back and crosses her arms over her chest, one eyebrow raised as she watches him put five rounds in the center of the target.
Bucky puts down his gun and takes off his headset. "What?"
"Batgirl? Really?"
"We punched some thugs. We had some waffles." He shrugs. "It was fun."
"It's good that you have interests in common." Natasha's expression is sincere but her voice is nothing but mockery.
"Shut up."
She hums noncommittally and then touches his arm briefly. "Good luck, James."
Later, he finds a file under his pillow, neatly labeled Stephanie Brown in Natasha's handwriting.
He thinks about all the people he'd only ever known as dossiers and targets, and Steph's cheerful assertion that she wants to know him, not the comics or the files or the media's version of him.
He appreciates Natasha's gift, but he doesn't read the file.
*
The next time he sees Steph, he's at a Wayne Enterprises reception honoring Commissioner Gordon and the GCPD.
"Since you like Gotham so much," Tony had said to him, "you can have my invitation."
"Yeah," said Clint, punching his shoulder and then wincing and shaking out his fist because he hit the left instead of the right. "I hear you're getting a little Bat action. The good kind."
Bucky rolled his eyes and took the invitation.
He has high hopes at first, scoping out a couple of curvy blondes who seem interested in the attention but turn out not to be the girl he's looking for. It turns out that Steph isn't one of Bruce's adopted kids, and she's not here glad-handing prospective donors and marginally clean cops with the boys. After he realizes that, he heads to the bar. At least the liquor at these things is always top shelf. When they make him go to Stark Industries events, he usually has Steve or Natasha or Clint to talk to, or if he's working, Sitwell's running wry commentary in his ear, but tonight, he's alone.
Twenty minutes and two drinks later, he figures he's put in enough face time to placate both Stark and Wayne (who was carefully blank when they shook hands upon his arrival, and Bucky's not sure what to make of that), and heads up to the roof of the hotel. Twilight is fading into the smudgy dark of a Gotham night, and he's about to head back inside to officially leave, when Batgirl lands on the roof beside him.
"Hey, soldier," she says, one hand on her hip and a saucy smile on her face. "Wanna go punch some bad guys?"
He grins back and reels her in for a kiss. He tastes cherry lip balm and Juicy Fruit gum when he licks into her mouth, and stills for a moment, caught up in a sudden flash of memory--his first night in Europe, and a small sweet reminder of home and better days.
She pulls back just far enough to whisper, "Bucky?"
"It's nothing." She gives him a skeptical look and he glances away, out at the Gotham skyline looming in the darkness. He shrugs. "We used to chew Juicy Fruit during the war."
"Oh. I can--"
"No," he says. "It's good. It's a good memory. I don't have a lot of those anymore."
"Okay," she says, one gloved hand lightly touching his cheek. "Okay." She kisses him this time, and he sighs into her mouth, pleased and hungry for more at the same time. He groans softly when she pulls away again. "Bad guys," she says breathlessly. "With the boys all dressed up for this party, someone's still gotta patrol."
"Yeah," he says, smiling against her cheek. "Okay. You wanna help me change into my gear?"
"Tempting, but since my basically omniscient boss is down in that ballroom and I'm supposed to be working, I'm gonna have to pass."
"Too bad." He kisses her again, quickly, and then heads back inside.
That night, they bust up a couple of muggings, one attempted rape, and a large drug shipment coming in from overseas. The sky has started to lighten by the time they deposit some zip-tied Marcone family goons on the front steps of Gotham Central with a card addressed to the Commissioner that says, Congratulations! Sorry I couldn't make your big night. xoxo, Batgirl.
"That was fun," she says when they meet up at the diner after changing back into civilian clothes. "Batgirl's kind of a solo gig, but sometimes I miss having a partner. I do enjoy a team-up."
"You used to work with a partner?" he asks, surprised.
Her expression goes flat, as blank as she can make it, but her face is so expressive that he can still see pain in the way her lips tighten and her eyes narrow. "Yeah," she says shortly, and snaps open her menu so she can hide behind it.
Bucky busies himself with stirring creamer into his coffee, though he usually takes it black, and then lays his spoon down on the saucer. "Hey," he says, "I didn't mean--"
Steph closes the menu and takes a deep breath. "No, I know. I'm sorry. It's--I'm over it." He raises his eyebrows, and she revises that to, "I'm mostly over it. I love being Batgirl. I'm good at it." He nods. "And if B--they take it away again, I can always go back to being Spoiler. I have before." She takes a sip of her own coffee. "Anyway, that's old news. I want to know more about you. You've partnered with Captain America and the Black Widow and the Avengers. I've never really been on a team. That must be so cool."
He laughs softly. "If you're old news, doll, then I'm history."
"I like history," she says, leaning forward and taking his left hand. She runs her thumb over the knuckles of his glove and he wishes he could feel more than a light pressure. "So, spill."
As they're eating waffles, he tells her a little about what he remembers of Brooklyn from before the war, about how even when Steve was a skinny, sickly kid, he was still the bravest person Bucky'd ever met, or maybe the stupidest, but he'd had the biggest, most generous heart in the world. "And that's what people don't understand. It wasn't the serum that made him Captain America," he says. "He was always a leader. It just made other people notice."
"Hey, I'm a huge Cap fan, really, but right now, I'm more interested in Bucky Barnes."
"Are you now?"
She leans forward and gives him a conspiratorial smile. "I am."
"You wanna come back to my hotel room, maybe order up some room service and bill it to Tony Stark?"
"Really? "
"Yeah."
"Okay."
"Come on." He pays the bill before she can get her money out, and she lets him.
"I haven't gotten paid yet this week," she says. "I'll get you next time."
He kisses her nose. It'd be kind of sickeningly cute if he didn't feel so good. "Okay."
In the elevator, she pushes him up against the railing and kisses the hell out of him, her hands tangling in the hair at the nape of his neck and her nails digging into the skin.
"Camera," he mutters against her ear and she laughs.
"You get used to 'em," she answers, which makes him wonder about some of the things he's heard about the Bats.
"I haven't," he says, and she kisses him again, softer this time, like she can make up for everything that's happened to him.
He holds her hand on the way to his room, fumbles a little with the keycard, anxious in a way he hasn't been in a long time. There have been other people since he got himself back, but they were mostly just to prove to himself that he could, that nobody was going to try to take this away from him again. With Steph--he likes her and he doesn't want to fuck it up.
She laughs, her breath warm on his cheek, and he manages to get the door open on the third try. He lets it swing shut behind them and then pushes her up against it, their kisses wetter and messier now, the desire he's kept tamped down all night uncoiling in his belly and slipping through his veins.
Steph tugs on his shirt and he lets her pull it over his head before he can think too much about it. She stops, then, and this is the moment--this is what he's afraid of--but she just meets his gaze squarely and asks, "Does it bother you? Does it hurt?"
"No. Not really. Not anymore."
She traces the knotty scar tissue lightly, first with the tips of her fingers--"Is this okay?" He nods, and then she follows her fingers with her tongue, and he has to swallow hard.
He lifts her easily and she wraps her thighs around his waist and squeezes. It's short trip to the bed, and they bounce down on it together, laughing between kisses. Even while they're rolling around on the bed, making out like teenagers (she still is a teenager, his traitorous brain reminds him), he can't turn his brain off, observing and cataloguing everything, like he's still on the job. Which is why he notices her little hitch, the split-second where she freezes, when he pushes up her shirt to get to her tits.
She's got scars of her own, silvery pink and smooth and fading red and knotty, all over her torso, and it looks like more than just the usual wear-and-tear of being a superhero.
He pulls back so he can look her in the eye. "Steph?"
She tugs the shirt back down and turns her face away. "You don't have to--" He doesn't know how she's going to end that sentence--look or touch or something like that--but he doesn't want to hear it.
"I don't care," he tells her. He lifts his left hand, the glove and the synthetic skin long gone and the shiny metal surface of it gleaming in the early morning light. "You're not the only one."
"I know. I just--I haven't, since," she gestures at herself, "with anyone. I can't explain to a civilian and I don't want to ruin any working relationships here in Gotham. Tried that once and it's taken years to fix it."
He rolls onto his back and lies beside her, twining their fingers together. "Do you want to tell me about it?"
She looks at him incredulously. "My bad breakup with Tim?"
"No. I mean, sure, if you want, though it sounds like he's an idiot, but what I meant was, do you want to tell me what happened to you?" He's sure that whatever it is, it's in Natasha's file, but he wants her to trust him enough to tell him.
"I--" She swallows hard and her fingers tighten around his. "I was Robin, you know."
"No, I didn't know that. That's what you meant about a partner."
"Yeah. Though I wasn't really. His partner, I mean. Batman didn't trust me enough, and I wanted to prove that he could. That he should. So I did something I thought would show him that I was," her voice cracks, "worthy. But it was something monumentally stupid, because I didn't have all the information."
"Because he didn't trust you."
"Yeah." She sniffs. "I got captured by the Black Mask and--well, you've seen the results. I screwed up, and I flatlined--you're not the only one who's come back from the dead." Her laugh is a little watery and he brings their joined hands up to his lips so he can press a kiss to her knuckles. "It took a year of healing and hard work and therapy to get back in the game. So I came back, and--here I am."
He gathers her close, and she tucks her head under his chin. "Here you are," he murmurs into her hair, which is tickling his nose. "Why?"
"What?"
"Why come back after all that?"
"Why did you?"
"The things I've done, Steph--I have a lot to atone for, and this is the best way I know how. But you? You got a second chance."
She raises her head to meet his gaze. "Because they keep telling me I can't."
He huffs a soft laugh. "Yeah, I've heard that before."
"Listen, for me, it's more than just beating up bad guys in back alleys. Though that is a nice perk. For some people, it's about vengeance, or justice. For you, it's about making amends, though from what you tell me, it wasn't even you who did all those things." She holds up a hand when he opens his mouth to dispute that. "But for me, it's about helping people who need it. And the hope that we can be better. That we can make things better. That I can make things better." She sniffs again, and he reaches over to the night table to grab a tissue for her. She wipes her eyes and nose and smiles tentatively. "I know it's corny."
"Hey, you don't know corny until you've met Captain America."
"Yeah? Is that something that could happen? Because that would be really cool."
He rolls onto his side, props his head up on his hand, and looks down at her. "I thought you were interested in Bucky Barnes."
"Don't get me wrong, I totally want to have hot makeouts with Bucky Barnes," she says, her smile brightening with confidence. "But Captain America is an icon.
"I'll see what I can arrange," he says with a theatrically long-suffering sigh. "I think he'd like you."
"Of course he would. What's not to like?" She tugs him down into hot, open-mouthed kiss and grins widely at him when she finally lets him go.
"Mmm," he hums in agreement, brain still hazy with lust.
"So, you said something about room service?"
He blinks. "We just had waffles."
"This whole talking about our feelings like adults thing is hard. It made me hungry again. Didn't it make you hungry again?"
"Yeah, okay," he says with a laugh, giving her another squeeze and then reaching for the phone. "I could eat."
end
~*~
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Say Good Morning to the Night
Captain America (2011)/Batgirl (comic); Steph/Bucky; pg; 4,170 words
"If you're old news, doll, then I'm history."
Pre-reboot, obviously.
Title from "Mona Lisas and Mad Hatters" by Elton John.
~*~
Say Good Morning to the Night
Bucky hates working in Gotham, but Sitwell swears the Bats are all out of town--the big guy is off on some JLA mission, Red Robin's in San Francisco with the Titans, and Nightwing is back in Bludhaven these days and allegedly keeping the littlest Robin out of trouble--so he sets up on the roof of a warehouse across from the docks and waits for the freighter carrying the stolen Phase 2 weapons to arrive.
His left hip has just started to twinge from the chill and the damp when the boat eases into the harbor. He breathes in slowly, centered and focused, but before he can draw a bead on the thugs moving around on deck, he's distracted by something moving in his peripheral vision.
A girl with long blonde hair and a yellow bat on her chest flings a batarang at his gun and says, "In Gotham, the good guys don't use guns."
The batarang explodes on impact and coats his rifle in some kind of gelatinous goop that is going to be hell to clean up, and only his quick reflexes ensure that he's not covered in it himself. "What the hell?"
She uses his shoulder to cartwheel into a series of flips that take her over to the next roof. "Tag! You're it!"
He launches himself after her, muttering, "I am too old for this shit." Her laughter floats back to him as she descends to the dock and kicks over two of the goons unloading the freighter, and he suddenly remembers what that was like--the simple joy of punching bad guys in the face--with a sharpness that takes his breath away for a moment.
The girl--Batgirl, he supposes, and he wonders why Sitwell didn't know there was a new one in town--is good, but he doesn't take the time to admire her, not when there are thugs to take down.
She's breathing hard by the time they're done and there's a long gash on her forearm that looks like it stings, but she's zip-tying the goons like she doesn't even feel it, and with the adrenaline rush from the fight, he figures she probably doesn't.
"I think this one is mine," he says, nudging Radnovic's prone form with the toe of his boot. Sirens start wailing in the distance, and he'd like to be gone before they arrive.
Batgirl holds up a gloved finger. "One moment, please." She cocks her head, obviously listening to someone on comms, and then says, "You can sort out jurisdiction with the GCPD, but you can't kill him." He opens his mouth but she shakes her head. "You know the rules, and they don't change just because the big guy's not here right now."
The sirens are getting closer now, and he resigns himself to a long night of arguing with local law enforcement and filling out paperwork.
"That's my cue to leave," she says, "but you should leave the guns at home and visit more often. Maybe next time, we can go for waffles." And she winks at him before she takes off, running a few steps before her grapple gun swings her up into the cloudy Gotham sky.
In spite of himself, Bucky grins, because a pretty girl winking at him never gets old, and the thought of Batgirl and waffles keeps him from growling too much at the cops and Sitwell while they sort out who's going to take charge of Radnovic and his thugs.
After that's done and they're on their way back to New York, Bucky says, "Is there a reason you didn't mention Batgirl in your Bat roundup?"
"We didn't know there was a new one." Sitwell frowns. "The Batman is not exactly forthcoming with SHIELD about his operations."
Bucky grunts noncommittally. Gotham is usually a no-go zone for them, and the rare times they do need to go there, they're supposed to give the Bat advance notice. Bucky knows how that galls Fury, and he knows that Steve and Bruce--uneasy allies at the best of times--have argued about it more than once. He tries not to get involved in those disputes; he keeps his head down and shoots where he's aimed so nobody decides that having a formerly brainwashed Soviet assassin running around loose is a bad idea.
The encounter is enough to make him agree to take another assignment in Gotham a few weeks later, though. He spends most of the night waiting for the club to empty out so he can place the bugs in Cobblepot's office. It's boring but easy, the kind of mission he'd usually complain about because it's a waste of his talents, but he's always had a weakness for waffles, and for girls who are good in a fight. It's not until he's installing a camera over the back door that Batgirl finds him.
"I thought you'd be stealthier," she says, crossing her arms over her chest.
He doesn't flinch. He's been expecting company, and pretending not to hope it'd be her. "You knew I was going to be here."
"Well, yes," she says, giving him a bright smile, "but you didn't know I would be here."
"I was hoping," he answers before he can think better of it.
"Flattery will get you--Well, it'll get you waffles, anyway."
His mouth curves in a half-grin. "Waffles?"
"Gotham City Diner, three blocks down, make a left on Adams." Another one of those white phosphorous smiles. "Fifteen minutes. Be there or be square."
He finds himself smiling in response as she disappears over the edge of the roof with a flare of her cape.
He grabs his jacket off his bike and gets there in ten. He watches a blonde girl in black yoga pants and a purple hoodie slide into a booth and chat with a waitress. He pulls the jacket on, shoves his domino into his pocket, and takes a deep breath. He used to be good at this, a million years and a thousand dead bodies ago.
He slips into the booth across from her and is greeted by another bright smile. "You made it! Early, even. Nice touch."
"I'm not one to make a lady wait."
"I appreciate that," she says.
The waitress comes back, pours coffee for both of them and offers Bucky a menu. "The usual?" she asks Batgirl.
"Yes, please."
The waitress turns to Bucky, who looks at Batgirl. "Is 'the usual' waffles?"
"Of course. With a side of bacon and some home fries."
Bucky hands the unused menu back to the waitress. "I'll have what she's having."
Batgirl grins at him over the rim of her coffee cup and he takes a moment to really look at her. She's younger than he expected, but not young enough to make him feel like a creep.
"Do I have something on my face?" she asks, and he realizes he's been staring too long.
"No, no, you look great. I just wasn't expecting--"
"You thought it would be masks on all the way."
"You guys have that reputation."
She nods. "Tried that once. Didn't end well."
"Oh."
"Yeah." She looks thoughtful and kind of sad, and he realizes he wants to see her smile again.
"So that thing you used on my rifle--"
"The gooperang," she says, brightening. "Cool, right?"
"Only because you didn't have to spend an hour cleaning it up."
She shrugs an unsympathetic shoulder. "You know the rules."
He doesn't tell her how SHIELD plays fast and loose with rules when they think it's necessary. How he's never been one to follow them either. "Yeah, but how'd you know I was a good guy?"
"What else would you be, wearing that?" She nods at his left shoulder, even though it's covered by his jacket now. "It's easy to say they're just symbols and their only purpose is to look cool, but we both know it's more than that. They mean something." He wants to call her naïve, because it might mean something to him (and to her), but anyone could exploit it if they really wanted to, and there's nothing Steve (or any of them) could do about it. It must show on his face, because she adds, "And besides, I know who you are."
"Really?"
"Yeah. I think everybody in our line of work knows who you are."
Unfortunately, that's probably true (and most of that is not, sadly, because of Steve), but he doesn't comment on it, or he'll just end up ranting. Instead, he asks, "And do I get to return the favor?"
The food arrives then, and they busy themselves with butter and syrup and ketchup on the home fries. He lets it go--he can find out easily enough, though it stings a little that she won't tell him.
"Steph," she says after she's devoured her waffle and bacon. She's pushing what's left of her home fries through a blob of ketchup. "I'm Steph."
"So, why's a pretty girl like you put on the cowl?"
She rests her knife and fork on her mostly empty plate and leans back, head cocked thoughtfully. "My dad was the Cluemaster."
"I don't know who that is."
"S'okay, not a lot of people do. He was kind of smalltime, but I wanted to stop him and I couldn't get Batman's attention. So I decided to do it myself."
"And one thing led to another?"
Her mouth curves ruefully, and her eyes are sort of faraway, like she's remembering something. "Yeah, something like that." She leans forward again, elbows on the table, twining her fingers and resting her chin on her hands. "What about you?"
"You know who I am."
"I know your name, and I've read the comics," she says, "but that's not," she waves a hand, "you."
His phone is buzzing in his pocket, so he says, "We don't have time for that today, but we should do this again sometime. Soon."
She grins again. "I'd like that." Her phone chimes then and her eyes widen in surprise. "Crap. I didn't realize it was so late." She pulls money out of somewhere and tosses it on the table. "That should cover mine, plus tax and tip. I've gotta run." She slides out of the booth, takes two steps, and comes back.
"Steph?"
"I had a really nice time," she says, leaning down and giving him a quick kiss. And then she's gone.
"Me, too," he mutters and grins at the waitress when she drops off the check.
After that, he makes it a point to volunteer for their rare missions in Gotham, so he can see her again.
It does not go unnoticed.
*
Natasha finds him on the shooting range. She leans back and crosses her arms over her chest, one eyebrow raised as she watches him put five rounds in the center of the target.
Bucky puts down his gun and takes off his headset. "What?"
"Batgirl? Really?"
"We punched some thugs. We had some waffles." He shrugs. "It was fun."
"It's good that you have interests in common." Natasha's expression is sincere but her voice is nothing but mockery.
"Shut up."
She hums noncommittally and then touches his arm briefly. "Good luck, James."
Later, he finds a file under his pillow, neatly labeled Stephanie Brown in Natasha's handwriting.
He thinks about all the people he'd only ever known as dossiers and targets, and Steph's cheerful assertion that she wants to know him, not the comics or the files or the media's version of him.
He appreciates Natasha's gift, but he doesn't read the file.
*
The next time he sees Steph, he's at a Wayne Enterprises reception honoring Commissioner Gordon and the GCPD.
"Since you like Gotham so much," Tony had said to him, "you can have my invitation."
"Yeah," said Clint, punching his shoulder and then wincing and shaking out his fist because he hit the left instead of the right. "I hear you're getting a little Bat action. The good kind."
Bucky rolled his eyes and took the invitation.
He has high hopes at first, scoping out a couple of curvy blondes who seem interested in the attention but turn out not to be the girl he's looking for. It turns out that Steph isn't one of Bruce's adopted kids, and she's not here glad-handing prospective donors and marginally clean cops with the boys. After he realizes that, he heads to the bar. At least the liquor at these things is always top shelf. When they make him go to Stark Industries events, he usually has Steve or Natasha or Clint to talk to, or if he's working, Sitwell's running wry commentary in his ear, but tonight, he's alone.
Twenty minutes and two drinks later, he figures he's put in enough face time to placate both Stark and Wayne (who was carefully blank when they shook hands upon his arrival, and Bucky's not sure what to make of that), and heads up to the roof of the hotel. Twilight is fading into the smudgy dark of a Gotham night, and he's about to head back inside to officially leave, when Batgirl lands on the roof beside him.
"Hey, soldier," she says, one hand on her hip and a saucy smile on her face. "Wanna go punch some bad guys?"
He grins back and reels her in for a kiss. He tastes cherry lip balm and Juicy Fruit gum when he licks into her mouth, and stills for a moment, caught up in a sudden flash of memory--his first night in Europe, and a small sweet reminder of home and better days.
She pulls back just far enough to whisper, "Bucky?"
"It's nothing." She gives him a skeptical look and he glances away, out at the Gotham skyline looming in the darkness. He shrugs. "We used to chew Juicy Fruit during the war."
"Oh. I can--"
"No," he says. "It's good. It's a good memory. I don't have a lot of those anymore."
"Okay," she says, one gloved hand lightly touching his cheek. "Okay." She kisses him this time, and he sighs into her mouth, pleased and hungry for more at the same time. He groans softly when she pulls away again. "Bad guys," she says breathlessly. "With the boys all dressed up for this party, someone's still gotta patrol."
"Yeah," he says, smiling against her cheek. "Okay. You wanna help me change into my gear?"
"Tempting, but since my basically omniscient boss is down in that ballroom and I'm supposed to be working, I'm gonna have to pass."
"Too bad." He kisses her again, quickly, and then heads back inside.
That night, they bust up a couple of muggings, one attempted rape, and a large drug shipment coming in from overseas. The sky has started to lighten by the time they deposit some zip-tied Marcone family goons on the front steps of Gotham Central with a card addressed to the Commissioner that says, Congratulations! Sorry I couldn't make your big night. xoxo, Batgirl.
"That was fun," she says when they meet up at the diner after changing back into civilian clothes. "Batgirl's kind of a solo gig, but sometimes I miss having a partner. I do enjoy a team-up."
"You used to work with a partner?" he asks, surprised.
Her expression goes flat, as blank as she can make it, but her face is so expressive that he can still see pain in the way her lips tighten and her eyes narrow. "Yeah," she says shortly, and snaps open her menu so she can hide behind it.
Bucky busies himself with stirring creamer into his coffee, though he usually takes it black, and then lays his spoon down on the saucer. "Hey," he says, "I didn't mean--"
Steph closes the menu and takes a deep breath. "No, I know. I'm sorry. It's--I'm over it." He raises his eyebrows, and she revises that to, "I'm mostly over it. I love being Batgirl. I'm good at it." He nods. "And if B--they take it away again, I can always go back to being Spoiler. I have before." She takes a sip of her own coffee. "Anyway, that's old news. I want to know more about you. You've partnered with Captain America and the Black Widow and the Avengers. I've never really been on a team. That must be so cool."
He laughs softly. "If you're old news, doll, then I'm history."
"I like history," she says, leaning forward and taking his left hand. She runs her thumb over the knuckles of his glove and he wishes he could feel more than a light pressure. "So, spill."
As they're eating waffles, he tells her a little about what he remembers of Brooklyn from before the war, about how even when Steve was a skinny, sickly kid, he was still the bravest person Bucky'd ever met, or maybe the stupidest, but he'd had the biggest, most generous heart in the world. "And that's what people don't understand. It wasn't the serum that made him Captain America," he says. "He was always a leader. It just made other people notice."
"Hey, I'm a huge Cap fan, really, but right now, I'm more interested in Bucky Barnes."
"Are you now?"
She leans forward and gives him a conspiratorial smile. "I am."
"You wanna come back to my hotel room, maybe order up some room service and bill it to Tony Stark?"
"Really? "
"Yeah."
"Okay."
"Come on." He pays the bill before she can get her money out, and she lets him.
"I haven't gotten paid yet this week," she says. "I'll get you next time."
He kisses her nose. It'd be kind of sickeningly cute if he didn't feel so good. "Okay."
In the elevator, she pushes him up against the railing and kisses the hell out of him, her hands tangling in the hair at the nape of his neck and her nails digging into the skin.
"Camera," he mutters against her ear and she laughs.
"You get used to 'em," she answers, which makes him wonder about some of the things he's heard about the Bats.
"I haven't," he says, and she kisses him again, softer this time, like she can make up for everything that's happened to him.
He holds her hand on the way to his room, fumbles a little with the keycard, anxious in a way he hasn't been in a long time. There have been other people since he got himself back, but they were mostly just to prove to himself that he could, that nobody was going to try to take this away from him again. With Steph--he likes her and he doesn't want to fuck it up.
She laughs, her breath warm on his cheek, and he manages to get the door open on the third try. He lets it swing shut behind them and then pushes her up against it, their kisses wetter and messier now, the desire he's kept tamped down all night uncoiling in his belly and slipping through his veins.
Steph tugs on his shirt and he lets her pull it over his head before he can think too much about it. She stops, then, and this is the moment--this is what he's afraid of--but she just meets his gaze squarely and asks, "Does it bother you? Does it hurt?"
"No. Not really. Not anymore."
She traces the knotty scar tissue lightly, first with the tips of her fingers--"Is this okay?" He nods, and then she follows her fingers with her tongue, and he has to swallow hard.
He lifts her easily and she wraps her thighs around his waist and squeezes. It's short trip to the bed, and they bounce down on it together, laughing between kisses. Even while they're rolling around on the bed, making out like teenagers (she still is a teenager, his traitorous brain reminds him), he can't turn his brain off, observing and cataloguing everything, like he's still on the job. Which is why he notices her little hitch, the split-second where she freezes, when he pushes up her shirt to get to her tits.
She's got scars of her own, silvery pink and smooth and fading red and knotty, all over her torso, and it looks like more than just the usual wear-and-tear of being a superhero.
He pulls back so he can look her in the eye. "Steph?"
She tugs the shirt back down and turns her face away. "You don't have to--" He doesn't know how she's going to end that sentence--look or touch or something like that--but he doesn't want to hear it.
"I don't care," he tells her. He lifts his left hand, the glove and the synthetic skin long gone and the shiny metal surface of it gleaming in the early morning light. "You're not the only one."
"I know. I just--I haven't, since," she gestures at herself, "with anyone. I can't explain to a civilian and I don't want to ruin any working relationships here in Gotham. Tried that once and it's taken years to fix it."
He rolls onto his back and lies beside her, twining their fingers together. "Do you want to tell me about it?"
She looks at him incredulously. "My bad breakup with Tim?"
"No. I mean, sure, if you want, though it sounds like he's an idiot, but what I meant was, do you want to tell me what happened to you?" He's sure that whatever it is, it's in Natasha's file, but he wants her to trust him enough to tell him.
"I--" She swallows hard and her fingers tighten around his. "I was Robin, you know."
"No, I didn't know that. That's what you meant about a partner."
"Yeah. Though I wasn't really. His partner, I mean. Batman didn't trust me enough, and I wanted to prove that he could. That he should. So I did something I thought would show him that I was," her voice cracks, "worthy. But it was something monumentally stupid, because I didn't have all the information."
"Because he didn't trust you."
"Yeah." She sniffs. "I got captured by the Black Mask and--well, you've seen the results. I screwed up, and I flatlined--you're not the only one who's come back from the dead." Her laugh is a little watery and he brings their joined hands up to his lips so he can press a kiss to her knuckles. "It took a year of healing and hard work and therapy to get back in the game. So I came back, and--here I am."
He gathers her close, and she tucks her head under his chin. "Here you are," he murmurs into her hair, which is tickling his nose. "Why?"
"What?"
"Why come back after all that?"
"Why did you?"
"The things I've done, Steph--I have a lot to atone for, and this is the best way I know how. But you? You got a second chance."
She raises her head to meet his gaze. "Because they keep telling me I can't."
He huffs a soft laugh. "Yeah, I've heard that before."
"Listen, for me, it's more than just beating up bad guys in back alleys. Though that is a nice perk. For some people, it's about vengeance, or justice. For you, it's about making amends, though from what you tell me, it wasn't even you who did all those things." She holds up a hand when he opens his mouth to dispute that. "But for me, it's about helping people who need it. And the hope that we can be better. That we can make things better. That I can make things better." She sniffs again, and he reaches over to the night table to grab a tissue for her. She wipes her eyes and nose and smiles tentatively. "I know it's corny."
"Hey, you don't know corny until you've met Captain America."
"Yeah? Is that something that could happen? Because that would be really cool."
He rolls onto his side, props his head up on his hand, and looks down at her. "I thought you were interested in Bucky Barnes."
"Don't get me wrong, I totally want to have hot makeouts with Bucky Barnes," she says, her smile brightening with confidence. "But Captain America is an icon.
"I'll see what I can arrange," he says with a theatrically long-suffering sigh. "I think he'd like you."
"Of course he would. What's not to like?" She tugs him down into hot, open-mouthed kiss and grins widely at him when she finally lets him go.
"Mmm," he hums in agreement, brain still hazy with lust.
"So, you said something about room service?"
He blinks. "We just had waffles."
"This whole talking about our feelings like adults thing is hard. It made me hungry again. Didn't it make you hungry again?"
"Yeah, okay," he says with a laugh, giving her another squeeze and then reaching for the phone. "I could eat."
end
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