[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

[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."

[from_the_outside]

"Tell Sam I say hi," she says, grinning at Bucky. "And that he still owes me."

"Oh, he knows," Steve says, and she can hear the laugh in his voice. "Copy that. Talk tomorrow."

When he hangs up, all she can do for a moment is look at the phone in her palm before shaking her head and looking back at Bucky.

"Well," she says, and can't think of anything else.

[nerves_of_ice]

He buries his face in his hand for a long moment, trying to keep his breathing from turning ragged with the sheer force of his relief.

It takes several seconds before he's able to look up at her again.

"Trust Steve to always know when he's needed," he says, quietly.

[from_the_outside]

She has no idea if it's the right move, but she can't hear that struggle he has with himself and do nothing, so she sets the phone and her cup aside and shifts forward on her knees to wrap her arms around his neck and hug him close.

"Yeah," she says, quietly, into his hair.

"You okay?"

[nerves_of_ice]

He puts his arm around her and lowers his head to her shoulder, just for a moment, before he pulls back and looks her in the eyes.

"Promise me you'll let him help," he says. "Unless it's clear there's no way he can manage the cover, promise me, Sharon."

[from_the_outside]

"I promise."

Her voice is a whisper as her hands go to his head. "I promise."

[nerves_of_ice]

A shudder runs through him, and he pulls her close again.

[from_the_outside]

She shifts as close as she can that isn't right into his lap and holds him tight, pressing her cheek and face against his hair, spreading her fingers wide and protective over the back of his head, feeling as though she might drown in this relief.

[nerves_of_ice]

Shivers pass through his body intermittently. He waits them out before he speaks again.

"Well. This changes a few things."

[from_the_outside]

She huffs a breath.

"Is it changing that 'I'm supposed to go under' to 'I will go under'?"