Joy ride (part1): Stealing

1: practical execution

AUTHOR'S NOTES: so hi everyone. This is my first posting on Wattpad. but I have a few years of experience in writing on ao3. and on ff.net before.

still haven't figured out how to connect with people here so.. ideas are welcome.

ill be updating this a bit, as an experiment. there's a lot more on ao3. like 40 chapters by now? well, just going to see if I  can get this off the ground here too.

<end of notes>

After that nose-dive into the Potomac, James (as he only later dubbed himself) had started to pick up the pieces of his past lives. More and more had surfaced, and he had tried to make a whole out of that jagged-edge jigsaw. It had taken some time, and some perspective, but James felt that he had built a decent, consistent, and loving person from the wreckage of memory.

Oh, James could not deny he had done some very bad shit. And some of it—in those first years of memory—he had done quite willingly. But, at least he'd done it for the right reasons. He'd done it out of love.

The American had loved the Sovjets, for saving him, and had happily removed any political dissidents endangering his Party. The ghost, somewhat jaded, had still loved the people that made the USSR to the point that he'd assassinated local leaders in the name of that Party, to prevent civil war. Yasha had beat trainees to death just to spare them a worse fate from failure. The Winter Soldier had murdered entire enemy platoons, just to protect his own squad. Even as the Asset, he'd know that he was supposed to be protecting someone, was supposed to be fighting for something, not that he'd had any inclining to what those things might have been.

So, yes. Bad things. Very bad things. But for the best of reasons. Good, not bad. Love, not hate.

James isn't even sure he hates Hydra. Not because there is anything to love about it, but because Hydra itself is hate. Or perhaps, more accurately, a symptom of hate. A name to a way of thinking that allows a person to look at another, and judge that person to be worthless; excess. Cullable; less than an animal. James thinks privately that this is the real reason two heads of Hydra grow back when one is cut. The true sickness runs deeper; a sickness society must have carried for centuries at the very least.

As incurable as the disease appears to be, James has little faith that Hydra can ever be defeated. But it can be slowed, and it can be hindered. And James will admit that there's a certain satisfaction to be gained from obstructing those sorry creatures actually willing to commit to Hydra's cause. It seems only natural to James that the best ways to do this it through love, trust and friendship.

This is why Bucky goes after Tony Stark to repair relations after the battle between him and Steve in Siberia. And this is why James now entrusts this story to Sam. To show that he can confide in Sam, that he trusts. James, or at least his projection, Bucky, means to show he loves both Sam and Stark, that he trusts them, and that he means to be their friend.

Sadly, James is well aware that his ideas of love are skewed, he has next to no memories of friends, and suggesting he could trust anyone beyond perhaps Steve is completely ludicrous. James sticks to honesty and hopes that is good enough for Sam.

"I did read up on Anthony Stark before showing up at his hospital bed." James admits, watching the Falcon for his reaction. "And concluded him to be a recluse pretending to be an extrovert, an adrenaline junkie with delusions of sanity, and a total rebel against every expectation or authority.

"So, honestly, I was surprised Tony had called a hospital at all. That he hadn't just opted to bleed out there in Syberia. You know, just for fucking pride and giggles." This at least gets a snort out of Sam, but he gives very few signs of approval or disapproval. That must be Sam's counselling training. James pushes ahead with his account regardless: