Harmless (Bucky Barnes)

(viii)

He doesn't expect to see you on TV.

In jail maybe, for something scandalous and completely unnecessary, but not TV.

But there you are, a signboard waving around furiously in your hand, voice in protest against the demolition of the community centre. You're flipping the board back and forth to alternate between the messages you've scrawled on the cardboard.

You were among a few protesting, but clearly the loudest.

He thinks that maybe he has the weekend off if you're too busy fighting big corporations. He'd send his support even.

Until he zeroes in on the sign when it flips over, finally reading what it says.

You better get your ass here, sarge

And so he does.

Half the crowd had dipped by the time he arrived. You were there, still the loudest, but he couldn't help but notice the lack of people as compared to an hour or two ago on TV. He supposed that justice could wait as long as it took to get lunch from the nearest café.

"I can't stop you from protesting, y'know." He's a little wary of approaching your raging self.

"Oh, hey Barnes. You got my message." You break away for a second to scream a bunch of obscenities at the gigantic glass building before turning to him. "You wouldn't be able to."

"What's your dumb plan then?"

"First of all, it's not dumb. It's stupid. Put some respect on my technological genius." You held up a finger. "Second of all, it's not here."

"Where is it?"

"At the construction site." You point down the road. "Come on."

Right along the way, you stop to chant another slogan. He waves his arm around meekly in support. He did, after all, have to stand up for what was right, but if his publicist saw him here she'd have an aneurysm.

The construction site isn't very far off. It's adjacent to the community centre, which he assumes they're going to tear down to make more space for whatever shitty commercial building was going to take its place.

There are already a few excavators and dozers there but no one to man them since it was lunch time. What garners his attention is the small silver plate that's on the floor a few feet ahead in the direction you're walking towards.

"Here." You stop once it nears. "The plan."

"Am I supposed to know what this is?" He lightly kicked at it, earning a smack on the arm from you.

"Stop that," you scolded, "and look at it. It's not hard to figure out."

He narrows his eyes. There's a small u-shaped piece of metal in the middle of the plate. "That's a magnet."

"Exactly." You clapped your hands together in excitement. "The world's strongest electromagnet."

He looks around. The only possibly magnetic things are the cranes and excavators around him.

"You're going to... stop the machines from moving ahead?" he hesitates in his deduction.

"Yep. Can't tear anything down if they can't get to it first."

Bucky looks down.

"Does this thing even work?" He toes at it again. "It's kinda small."

"It works beautifully, stop kicking at it, you demon-"