[oom] I'm right here beside you

[from_the_outside]

 Sleep is a joke.

It's not just the intel that she stays up sifting through, blue light straining her eyes; it's not just the coffee she drinks, trying to keep her brain sharp and her thoughts on track. 

It's time.

Minutes that slip away, that she can't get back. Hours that tick ponderously past. She lies alone in her bed and can't close her eyes because if she does, if she sleeps, it's another night gone, another night closer to the day Bucky goes back under and –

So she stays up and works. 

It means that when she waits for him in the morning to come find her before they meet with T'Challa and the others, her skin is pale and translucent and she has that sick feeling of an all-nighter, fatigue poisons running rampant through her bloodstream – but she has a list of observations from her analysis, and two mugs of coffee kept warm on the credenza: one pale with milk and sugar, the other black and as strong as her little coffee maker could handle.

Comments

[nerves_of_ice]

"Yeah, it's not like that," he reassures her.

"It definitely wasn't like that the first time Shuri put me under. I was awake, and then it was cold and I closed my eyes, and then I was awake again. It didn't feel like any time had passed at all."

[from_the_outside]

She takes a long deep breath and smiles, very slightly. "Good."

Small favors. "With any luck it won't be much time, anyway."

[nerves_of_ice]

"Longer for you than for me," he murmurs, and squeezes her hand.

[from_the_outside]

"Yes," she says, straight-faced. "I will pine away. It'll be very Victorian. Do you think I could get a fainting couch put in my room?"

It's easier to tease than to look down the barrel of the weeks ahead, but her fingers tighten on his anyway and make a liar out of her.

[nerves_of_ice]

"By the window," he suggests, and lifts her hand for a quick kiss to her fingers. "That way you can pine with a view."

[from_the_outside]

"Too much sun," she counters. "I can't be all dramatically wan and pale if I'm soaking up a puddle of sunshine every afternoon. And – do you hear that?"

She pauses for a second, listening. It's faint, but – "I think that's my phone."

Leaning forward, she gives him a quick kiss and a wry look before she disentangles herself from around him. "I better answer it. Could be Fury again."

[nerves_of_ice]

"Hasn't been twenty-four hours," he notes, even as all animation fades from his expression, leaving only watchful neutrality behind.

He grabs the carrier and pushes it her way, making it easier for her to find the phone.

[from_the_outside]

"Fury plays by his own rules," she says, getting to her feet. "No, it's in my tote, one second – "

The ringing stops before she gets to her bag, still leaning against the wall of the hut, but starts again as she digs through its contents. Unknown number blinks on the screen and she takes a fortifying breath, then hits the button and brings the phone to her ear. "Yes?"

For a second or two, nothing happens, then all the stress and aggravation melt away like they were never there, and Sharon smiles, really smiles, all relieved pleasure before her eyes meet Bucky's. "Hi," she says, and smiles again. "Yeah. Hang on."

She comes back over to the blanket, saying "I'm putting you on speaker," before she sits back down across from Bucky and holds the phone out, thumbing the speaker icon.

"Hey, Buck," says Steve Rogers, all warmth and reassurance, and Sharon can't help but feel, like she always does at the sound of his voice, that everything will be fine. "Nat told me the strangest thing today, about Fury."

There's a laugh in his voice. "Figured I should give you both a call and see what he's up to."

[nerves_of_ice]

"Steve," he says, and the coldness that had been seeping in is washed away like it was never there. "Hey, yourself."

Bucky smiles at the phone, then at Sharon, before he adds, "Yeah, it was a hell of a surprise for everyone, I think. Looks like he's not done sticking his fingers into every pie he can find."

[from_the_outside]

"Sounds like Fury, all right," Steve agrees, sounding more than a little wry. "He's always got something up his sleeve. He give you anything useful?"

"Useful, yes," Sharon says. "How we'll use it is still up in the air, but he had some good intel."

Steve makes a thoughtful noise, then: "What's the catch?"

"He wants a favor," Sharon tells him, glancing at Bucky. "You know how he is. He wants a string he can pull on down the line when he needs it."

[nerves_of_ice]

The look he gives her is more exasperated than before.

"He wants a favor from Agent 13," he clarifies. "Help on one or two of his own concerns is how he put it." There's no hiding the way his tone flattens. "T'Challa's got a couple of alternatives in mind to offer, but whether or not he'll bite is anyone's guess."

[from_the_outside]

Her expression flattens as he speaks, until –

"Wait, what do you mean T'Challa has alternatives?" She frowns at him, hard. "Did you talk to him today?"

[nerves_of_ice]

"Yes," Bucky says, without even a hint of apology. "He wanted to talk to me about it before we tell Fury I'm here."

"Do you think that's a good idea?" Steve says. The way he asks it shouts his opinion.

"If he already knows, trying to hide it's not going to get us anywhere. If he doesn't, then it's intel, and he'll love that," Bucky replies. "It also makes it look like we're not worried about him knowing."

[from_the_outside]

"We are worried about him knowing," says Sharon, a little annoyed. "Okay. What alternatives did you and T'Challa talk about?"

"Hang on," says Steve, who's clearly at arrears being on the phone instead of there in person. "What was the intel?"

Sharon breathes in through her nose, but he's right: the op is the priority here. "He caught chatter about a weapons auction," she says. "In two weeks. Right now the plan is we get someone on the inside, posed as a buyer."

[nerves_of_ice]

"And right now," he adds, levelly, "that someone's likely to be Sharon."

"I see." Steve sounds like he's chewing that over and doesn't like the taste.

"Uh-huh," Bucky says.

[from_the_outside]

"And Sharon will be fine," she says, rolling her eyes at them. "The problem is I can't go in with anyone Wakandan, it would give up the ruse."

"Wait," says Steve, sounding concerned. "Buck, you're not –"

"No," Sharon assures him. "He shouldn't operate outside Wakanda, and anyway –"

She pauses, lifts her eyebrows at Bucky. You wanna tell him, or should I?

[nerves_of_ice]

He sighs, rough and low, scrubbing his hand through his hair in frustration before he lets it drop. Although it's clearly loud enough for Steve to hear, Steve doesn't push, but waits him out.

"I'm not," he confirms, finally. "I can't. Besides what -- what we talked about before, I..."

A long beat of silence hangs in the air before he says, "Shuri's ready to finish the job. I'm supposed to go back under next week."

[from_the_outside]

Supposed to. She narrows her eyes at him while Steve blows out a breath over the phone.

"I'm coming out," he decides, and she transfers her frown to the phone. "Steve –"

"I'm not asking permission," he says, and there's a core of steel under his easy tone. "Buck, I know you wanna be there. Believe me, I know how it feels. Tag me in; I'll go with Sharon."

[nerves_of_ice]

"I believe you," he says, quietly. Something flickers in his eyes as he glances at Sharon, there and gone in a moment, but clear all the same - guilt mixed with deep, desperate relief.

"How's this going to affect what you and Natasha and Wilson have going on?"

It's not a 'no,' and he knows Steve will hear that as well as the question he's asking.

[from_the_outside]

"It won't," Steve assures them. "Some of the same players are involved in this, we think. Nat and Sam can work the other end of the op with Fury; I'll come help you."

God, it sounds – it's too good to be true, and Sharon gives Bucky a quizzical look as she speaks to the phone.

"Steve – no offense, but you are crap at spy stuff, and you have one of the most famous faces in the world. People will recognize you."

He laughs, apparently unconcerned. "You think I haven't picked anything up from going off the grid with Natasha Romanoff?" he asks, cheerful. "I think we can work around it."

She bites at her lip and looks at Bucky again, lifting her eyebrows slightly. "It could work," she admits.

And if it did –

– Wouldn't it solve so many problems?

[nerves_of_ice]

"It could," he agrees. "Steve--"

"I'll be there before you go under," Steve interrupts. "That'll give us time enough to plan."

"And time enough to see just how much you've picked up," he says, dryly, as Steve laughs. "You never know. I might surprise you."

[from_the_outside]

"It'd be a good surprise, at least," Sharon says, smiling despite herself.

It could work. It really could. And if there's anyone Bucky would trust to go in his stead –

"We're briefing with Fury tomorrow morning, oh-eight hundred," she says. "Do you want to get patched in then too?"

[nerves_of_ice]

"You bet," Steve tells them. "If nothing else, it might give Fury second thoughts about trying to do anything with the new information he's about to learn."

"I already promised Sharon I'd try not to shoot him again," Bucky says, dryly. "Think that'll help?"

"Let's just make sure you don't have a reason."

[from_the_outside]

"It might help more if you made that promise to Fury," Sharon says, dry, and reaches for her cup of wine for the first time since she'd sat back down.

Also, he had almost immediately offered to take that promise back if Fury tried to manipulate her using him, so.

"That's true," Steve agrees. "On the other hand, he might deserve it."

She shakes her head, laughing silently. "Careful, there."

"Oh-eight hundred," Steve says, sounding not at all repentant. "And I'll see you both soon."

[nerves_of_ice]

"Fury wouldn't believe me anyway," he says, with a slight wry twist to the corner of his mouth. "See you soon. Tell Natasha I said hey."

"What about Sam?" Steve asks, and Bucky lets out a dry sound. "Ask me again once he gets over me breaking his wing."