(no subject)

[bottledblond]

"New York City isn't exactly known for it's large, indigenous wolf population."

Steve isn't really paying attention to Tony Stark's yammering over a file he'd probably glanced at and tossed aside. He's too busy trying to get the screen to work properly so that a flick of his thumb across the surface won't send him ten pages ahead in the document he's trying to read or close out the pictures he's attempting to enhance. He understands the whole concept of renewable resources and he understands that the environment can't really sustain felling trees willy nilly, but he misses being handed folders with actually paper to spread out on the table in front of him.

Nastasha, thankfully, takes pity on him and the images of men and women with their throats pulled out appear on the large screen on the wall behind her. Steve isn't particularly pleased to see these things up close but he needs to know what they're actually planning her.

"Trained attack dogs?" Sam offers, but Steve, squinting, shakes his head.

"Germans used dogs during the war," he half muses. "That sort of mauling isn't what dogs can do. It's too--"

"Clean," Natasha offers and Steve nods. "This isn't the first time SHIELD has come across something like this." The photos on the screen change, become older and grainier. Not as clear. Steve can hear Tony muttering about glasses but ignores him again. "Same MO. Same lethal precision. Same wounds. They recovered fibers at the scene. Same fibers we have this time around too."

Steve's eyebrow arches. "You're going to say wolf?"

Natasha is grim as she nods. "Almost."

Bruce finally chimes in too. "Not just wolf," he says, adjusting nothing at all on his face as he's actually handed over his glasses to Stark, who is comically wearing them and looking pleased with himself. "Wolf and human DNA. I checked the old fibers too. It's unreal."

"So we have sixty years of attacks that tend to occur in three night cycles every month with a few years off in between groups," Tony says, leaning back, still in Bruce's glasses. "Sounds like a werewolf to me."

Steve snorts. "Now I've heard of a lot of crazy things," hell, he is one of those things, "but let's not jump to extremes. Do you think you can use the fibers from last night's attack to get a reading on where we might be able to find out who is--"

"Or what," Tony interrupts. "And yes. Ahead of you as always. We're ready to go for tonight."

There's not much else that needs to be discussed and so Steve nods, leaves the tablet behind to get some rest, and just after nightfall, heads to his spot on a roof not too far away from the Hudson River in Hells Kitchen to wait for something to happen. He expects nothing will, or that one of the other Avengers will be closer to the action when Tony's sensors go off.

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[bottledblond]

“Bucky!”

Steve’s distress is all that JARVIS needs to alert Tony, who reluctantly flips back on the video feed from inside the containment unit. He’s on his sneakered feet just a moment later, the sound of the stool falling over startling Banner. It’s a good thing the man has a lid on the Hulk. Startling Banner is one of those things that Steve had always been so cautious of and he’d be pretty upset to know that he directly caused it this time.

Wordlessly, Bruce and Tony head out of the room, though Steve’s on his feet too and moving swiftly towards his friend.

“Stop!” It doesn’t occur to him that Bucky likely has a tracking device. Or that he’s pulling it out. He only sees blood.

[endsinafight]

Digging the device out of that shoulder is both difficult and painful, which, he's sure is why they put it there. He knows there's at least one more for certain, and likely more than that. His tolerance level for pain is higher than most by far, and while it's anguishing to claw his way into a part of his body that's already sustained so much injury, he doesn't make a single noise. He barely hears Steve's alarmed voice as he manages to get a hold of the tiny metallic implant, managing to yank it out even as he hears footsteps approaching from different directions.

He shudders and holds it up, fingers slick with blood. "I forgot it was there," he tells Steve, finally registering the distress on his face.

"What's happening?" Bruce asks as JARVIS unlocks the door and it slides open. He stands just inside the containment room, staring wide-eyed at the scene before him.

[bottledblond]

Though Steve has, more or less, managed to calm himself down in the time it had taken for the doors to open, there' still an awful lot of blood all over the place and the worry on Steve's face hasn't all vanished. The sight looks bad, though it doesn't look as if Steve had gotten injured and honestly, that's all Tony really cares about in this situation.

Tony flings a pair of gloves at the doctor, not that Bruce needs to protect himself, but because Tony can't stand the thought of someone messing around inside of a wound like that without the air of sterility. He isn't getting too close, even if he immediately understands what Bucky had been doing.

It makes him smirk. "They knew where you were if STRIKE is part of HYDRA. But we can use that. Got anything else in there? Don't answer. J?" The scan is, of course, instantaneous and painless. The AI does come up with a variety of interesting things, but none of them are other tracking devices.

"That's all there is, Sir."

Tony nods. "Good. Then we can buy ourselves some time and say we're moving Bucko to the Raft."

[endsinafight]

Bruce pulls the gloves on automatically, even if he's not really that kind of doctor. He's the closest thing to it at the moment, and there's a man bleeding somewhat profusely who doesn't even seem to be taking notice of the extent of his own injury. It's a troubling sign and he can't help casting a glance at Steve as he approaches Bucky slowly.

Bucky is all too aware that there are two faces that are still relatively unfamiliar and that one of them is approaching him, albeit cautiously, like approaching a cornered animal. Which isn't too far off the mark, really. He tracks Bruce's movements with a wary gaze, shaking his head. "I'm still functional. Healing time from this injury is less than three hours," he tells him.

Bruce draws in a breath and looks over at Steve, uncertain. The fact that Bucky already has an estimated healing time for his injuries is a signal of just how often he's been wounded in similar ways, and if that's not disturbing enough, the man's still holding onto a tracking device that had been planted inside his body, likely against his will.

[bottledblond]

"You're a person," Steve says, not too sternly, but not with whispered reproach either. He's being firm here, and tough. "You're not a machine." He doesn't bother to apologize to JARVIS. JARVIS isn't a machine either, not as far as he's concerned. "It's all right that you did that, but it's a little impulsive. We could have gotten that out of you a little less painfully. It looks like it really hurts, pal."

His eyes are soft, eyebrows lifting with worry, when he holds his hand out for the tiny bit of red colored metal in his hand.

"Can I have that? Tony might be able to do something with it."

"Oh, like reverse the signal? Yeah, guess I could," Tony says with faked nonchalance.

[endsinafight]

He frowns at Steve's words, struggling to balance two realities in his head: one where he's a weapon that no one is supposed to touch for something minor like blood loss, and another, where he knows Steve -- knew him when he'd been a person. His gaze flickers warily to where Bruce has halted, hands up in the universal sign of surrender, like he's afraid of Bucky or what he might do. He's never been allowed to say no to anyone, let alone a doctor or scientist and his shoulders drop a little in reluctant agreement.

"Okay."

Bucky holds the tracking device out, dropping it into Steve's hand without reservation.

On the one hand, Bruce is concerned at how easily Bucky simply acquiesces to treatment he clearly doesn't want. On the other hand, werewolf or super soldier or whatever they're dealing with here and fast healing aside, he's still injured. "I'm just going to take a look and see what we need to do, all right?" He gives Bucky a small smile as he steps up, watching the way the other man tenses even as Bruce examines his shoulder.

"Okay, let's -- clean it and put a compress on it to stop the bleeding, all right? Nothing scary."

[bottledblond]

"Nothing scary," Steve agrees, crouching at Bucky's feet. "Like all of those times I had to fake asthma attacks so you wouldn't run away when you were getting your shots," he continues, grin on his face. He needs to get out of the uniform, and he will shortly. Bucky seems to be going in and out of personhood here, but he hasn't snapped and tried to hurt anyone. That's probably a good sign.

To Steve, that means that Bucky's 'snapping' had been more indicative of the man behind the weapon trying to break free of his captors. And that won't happen here. Hopefully. He just needs Bucky to recognize him for who he is when (or more like if) that should ever happen.



[sorry for the delays. My township is going crazy that it's gonna rain on Halloween and I've been glued to facebook with popcorn for all of the drama. I always went trick or treating despite the rain. Or the snow one year. :)

[endsinafight]

His gaze focuses on Steve's face as he crouches in front of him, tuning out the fact that the large man is examining him, dabbing the injury with alcohol or peroxide -- it burns but it's nothing that fazes him. There's a smile on Steve's face as he tells him about something from their past. "You were sick all the time." His words are hesitant, a little uncertain. He has a flash of an image of Steve, smaller, shaking in a too-small bed with a fever and chills.

Bruce glances between them, but focuses his attention mostly on putting pressure on the wound to stem the blood flow.



[it's okay. we're supposed to get a rain/snow mix tomorrow. the weather never bothered me either. give me candy dammit. XD]