Captain America and Bucky Barnes Imagines

91. BUCKY: Love is a Battlefield

A/N: This was a wonderful request from BuckysGirl42! I poured a TON of thought, time, and effort into this one. I wanted to relay a lot of emotion and character development without making the story too long. I hope you like it, and I hope everyone else likes it as well!

The bold italics, which start the story, are a conversation between the reader and her therapist. The rest is her and Bucky's story.

Words: 5.1K

           

"I have a problem, Doc."

"I assumed you probably did, Sargent Y/N, because it's been quite a long time since you willingly came to see me for a session."

"I know, I know. Sorry about that. But for a while after I came back everything was... everything was fine. Now..."

"Now what?"

"That's exactly the question I've been asking myself since I stepped off of that plane."

"I see. Why don't you tell me where the problem starts and we can work our way back from there, Y/N."

"Start at the beginning of the problem?"

"Yes, so we can try to identify what it is."

"Oh, I know exactly what it is. I can tell you where it started, too. The problem's name is Bucky Barnes."

"I need four units of O-Neg and I needed it yesterday!" you scream over your shoulder into the storm of sand. Stampeding feet have brought the dust up in clouds that settle down onto every visible inch of sweaty flesh you have peeking out of the grey-green military garb.

"Where the hell is my blood?!" you shout again—hoping to hell that one of these imbeciles carrying the body carts around you will listen.

You jog behind your patient as he's wheeled into the medical tent. The Afghan winds howl outside where tires once screamed—bringing these soldiers who'd been mid-mission before the slaughter began.

Coming into the medical tent, carrying a half-dead woman on his shoulder, is someone you've never seen before: not here in Afghanistan, at least. But you're important enough to have received the memo stating Captain America and his sidekick, Sargent Barnes, were going to be on that operation today: the one that ended in five casualties and countless injuries.

"Sargent Barnes," you make an assumption about the man in nearly all black with the dark brown hair and brooding, war-stricken eyes. "There are free beds at the East side of the tent."

"Yes, Ma'am," are the first words he ever speaks to you.

"Call me Doctor or call me Sargent, but never ma'am." Your eyes never move away from the tourniquet you're fastening around a thigh to stop lower leg bleeding. Your hands, bare and chapped, work fast and without thought. "Where the fucking hell is my blood?"

Out of the corner of your vision you watch Barnes deliver the soldier on his arm to one of the few free beds. A couple of assisting medics rush to tend to her wounds. You don't have to look very long to know she won't make it. There's too much damage done to her torso and stomach. It'd take a miracle to save her, and you're not a miracle worker. You're a doctor who has to prioritize the needs of the living and the walking dead.

"Get Lieutenant Martine over there some morphine. Make her comfortable." Your order doesn't fall upon deaf ears this time. One of the assistants nods his head and solemnly heads off to the medical crate—looking for that vial of poppy-drug to put the woman at rest before the eternal sleep.