Fictober

Her shoulders shake as she cries, hiccuping occasionally, her breath hitching constantly. Bucky stays silent except to comfort her, kissing the top of her head, rocking her in his arms. Bucky only starts to pull away once she’s calmed down, but even then, its so he can cup her cheeks in his hands, thumbs swiping at her tears, eyes meeting hers.

“Hey, sweetheart. You scared me a bit there.”

“Sorry,” Liliya sniffs, leaning into him, fingers clutching his shirt.

“No, don’t apologize. Just talk to me, okay? Do you wanna tell me what that nightmare was about?” Bucky asks, wrapping his arms around her shoulders. She shakes her head, curling into him more.

“Okay, that’s okay. You wanna go back to sleep?”

“No.” She blurts, tightening her grip on him.

“Just stay here, then?” He asks, automatically shifting to get comfortable. She nods, taking a steadying breath. He rocks her in his arms, running a hand through her hair. Liliya’s eyes start to flutter shut against her will, and she eventually falls asleep. Bucky smiles when he hears her breathing even out, becoming deeper, and shuts his eyes, keeping her close.

But only a few minutes go by before someone’s bursting through the door. Ava, John, and Yelena. All of whom had heard Liliya yell a few minutes before. Bucky’s eyes flicker open, just so he can give them a stern look.

“I’ve got it.” He grumbles, shooing them away.

“He’s gotten bossier,” Yelena comments under her breath as they leave.

“He’s gotten protective.” John corrects, obviously knowing what he’s talking about. They may forget from time to time, but he’s still a father.

Ava glances back one more time before shutting the door, shaking her head with a chuckle. “Yeah, I think I see it.”

Yelena nods in agreement, yawning. “I’m heading back to bed. Goodnight.”

“’Night.”

“Yup, g’night.”

Once she’s left, Ava and John glance awkwardly at each other.

“Yeah, I’m just gonna… go back to bed,” Ava says, turning on her heel, walking toward her room. She still hasn’t gotten used to John’s presence fully. Not yet, at least.

Yelena ends up being unable to sleep and finds herself in a pair of leggings, a sweatshirt, and some pointe shoes, warming up in the gym. Ava alsofinds her there, about half an hour later, as she goes through the movements. She’s surprised to see Yelena so relaxed; She stays quiet as she moves to her own corner, wrapping her fists.

“Couldn’t sleep either, eh?” Yelena asks when she eventually takes a break, strands of her hair sticking to her damp forehead.

“Nope.” Ava huffs, punch after punch landing on the bag. Her shoulders are tense, movements rough.

Yelena hums in response, taking a sip of water. She can’t help but stare, noticing the small details, like how the sweat drips down her neck, glistening in the low light of the gym. Her eyes follow Ava’s movements, catching how tense she seems. How the punching bag isn’t enough.

“Let’s spar.”

“Wha- huh?” Ava freezes, glancing back at her. Yelena’s already halfway through taking off her pointe shoes.

“You heard me. Come on.” She says, flicking her head, gesturing to the sparring mat. Ava hesitates, but eventually does as she asked.

“Don’t hold back, Starr,” Yelena warns before landing the first hit. Half an hour later, they’re panting and sweating, smiles on their faces. They’re teasing each other and actually laughing.

“Good round,” Yelena says, patting her on the shoulder.

“You too.” Ava nods, smiling hesitantly, glancing over at her.

“I uh… I should probably go shower now.” Yelena says awkwardly, shifting her weight between her feet, not actually moving.

“Yeah, you stink.” Ava teases, making Yelena scoff, rolling her eyes.

“Hilarious, Starr.”

“Ava.”

“Huh?” Yelena asks, caught off guard.

“Just call me Ava.” She says, giving her a small smile, standing a bit close to be considered friendly. “I’m okay with it.”

“Okay…. Ava. I’ll uh… I’ll see you later.” Yelena mumbles, turning to leave, cheeks flushed.

The next time they interact, its while they’re sitting in the kitchen, watching Bucky teach Liliya how to make eggs. Once they’re done cooking, and Liliya has turned to face them to hand them plates, she finds them sitting a bit close, leaning toward each other.

“Uh, here.” She stumbles out, putting the plates down and turning back around to get her own plate. Bucky, seeing the flustered look on Liliya’s face, looks to see what the cause was.

“Okay, get a room, you two.” He huffs, grabbing his own food and sitting down.

“Wow, homophobic much?” Ava teases, not expecting him to actually retort.

“I’m gay, Starr.” He deadpans, stabbing his eggs.

At that moment, Alexei and John are walking in. John freezes, a bewildered look on his face. “You’re what?”

“You heard me.”

“Yeah, you heard Mr. Soldier, Walker,” Alexei pitches in, happily grabbing himself a plate. “He’s gay.”

"You guys didn't know?" Comes Bob's voice from the doorway. Promptly, the room becomes loud, chaotic, voices rising over other voices. 

"Wait, you were speculatin' my sexuality?!" Bucky eventually exclaims, putting the pieces together. The chaos only grows from there. 

"Allison's dad is a psychopath," I hissed, tugging at my restraints for all I was worth. Across from me, my boyfriend Scott did the same.

"I'm definitely glad he's on our side now."

I snorted. "At least when he was trying to kill us we could avoid him. We should've told him to get lost when he suggested this stupid training."

"At least it might be harder for anybody else to tie us up successfully next time."

"I know you're right, but I'm still annoyed."

Scott huffed, and after another moment, I paused my struggling to take a breath.

Scott and I currently sat tied to two chairs in the burned out former Hale living room, with nothing but our own ingenuity available to help us escape. Scott's chair had a very low level of electriticy pulsing through the seat of it to keep him from changing. And Argent had made sure I didn't have a weapon on me for an easy means of escape.

He was thorough, for sure. And as frustrated as I currently felt, in the back of my mind, I did know it was better to find a reliable way to escape now than the next time someone or something in Beacon Hills tried to kill us.

"Okay, we need to think about this," I said. "Obviously we're not going to be able to break out of here just on strength, especially thanks to the little electric shock thing that Argent set up-"

"I... I don't know if I'm going to be able to do this."

My head snapped up, and I looked at Scott with a more critical eye for the first time since Argent had pulled the hoods off our heads. His shoulders were raised, whole body tensed, and I could see sweat starting to drip down his face from here. Even with a very low voltage on the electrical current, it was clearly starting to get to Scott. And without his superstrength or my usual weapons, we had to rely on pure smarts.

"It's okay, Scott, I know we can do this. We just have to think. Just focus, as much as you can though the stupid anti-werewolf precautions. I know we can find a way out of this. Stupider people than us have done this."

Scott huffed a breathy laugh and shot me a look.

"Like who? I don't know if you've noticed, but I'm not exactly famous for being smart."

I scoffed loudly.

"McCall, be serious right now. You've outsmarted and—sorry about the phrasing—outfoxed some of the scariest and sneakiest people we've ever faced, including Peter and Gerard. And you got a B on your English paper last week. You're smart as hell, especially when it comes to quick thinking in incredibly intense scenarios that require crazy and clever solutions. I'd put my money on you any day, especially over people like Ethan and Aiden and Jackson, who I've pretty much only ever seen rely on their strength to get them out of a tough situation."

Scott smiled, then glanced down in an attempt to hide it. If Argent's stupid restraints hadn't been in my way I would've rushed across the room to pick my boyfriend's head up and kiss him.

As it was, I had nothing to do but twist my hands in their bonds again. In the past, people had at least been able to come in with a weapon. But ever since the darach had taken all 12 of Argent's knives or whatever, he insisted that we work on escaping without that crutch available to us.

I grunted, then tried to turn my frustration into super strength. Unfortunately, it didn't work, although maybe it would if my frustration kept getting worse-

"I... think I have an idea."

I snapped my head up to look at Scott. He still looked tensed and stressed, but more focused and determined than I'd seen him since we got here, too.

"What's your idea?"

"If I can change, we can get out of here, right?"

"Right."

"And the thing that's keeping me from changing is the electric current."

"Yeah..."

"So I'm thinking, if you can inch your way over to put one of your chair legs on the wire, then I can knock myself over and hopefully break the connection."

"...Scott, that might actually work."

"It also might not work. And if you're on the wire and something goes wrong, you could get hurt..."

"It won't kill me, and it's our best shot at getting out of here. Come on, let's do this."

Scott pursed his lips, but he gave me a tight nod. Slowly, carefully, I shifted my weight around and got on my toes to start moving my chair to the nearest point on Argent's stupid electrical wire. It took longer than I wanted it to, but I had to be careful; if I tipped myself over before getting close enough to the wire to anchor it for Scott, we were in serious trouble.

Finally, I reached the wire. I managed to shift one of the chair legs onto it, then I shifted as much of my weight as possible onto that single leg of the chair.

"Ready?" asked Scott. I glanced down at the wire, then met my boyfriend's eyes again and nodded.

"Ready as I can be."

"Okay. Let's hope this works."

"It's a good idea. We've got this."

Scott and I shared a smile, then he took a deep breath. I tensed all my muscles, doing everything possible to keep the wire in place, and then he hurled himself sideways in his chair.

The wire went taught, then snapped and flew away from the chair. I heard Scott grunt when he hit the floor, but I couldn't help a triumphant laugh, either.

"It worked! It worked, right?"

In response, I heard Scott growl. From where I still sat, I could see his nails grow claws, and a moment later he burst out of the ropes that were holding him. He rolled away from the chair, and by the time he got to his feet he no longer looked like a wolf, although his grin had a wolfish edge to it.

"It worked."

"Ha ha! Nice! Now turn off this electricity and untie me."

"Oh! Yeah."

Scott rushed over, quickly taking care of the electricity and my restraints. I flung my arms around him as soon as I was free, pulling him in for a hug and a kiss.

"Nice work, babe," I said, absolutely beaming as I kept my arms looped around his neck. He squeezed me a little tighter, pulling me closer to him by the waist, a giant smile on his own face.

"I can't believe that actually worked," he said, the goofy smile I'd fallen in love with spreading across his face. I smiled, too, leaning further into him.

"I can."

Scott huffed a little laugh as I closed the rest of the distance between us, pulling him in for another kiss. I could've stayed like that without moving for a long time, but of course we couldn't just be left in peace.

"Not bad."

Scott and I broke apart at the sound of Argent's voice, echoing from the doorway between us and the exit of the Hale house. I glanced over Scott's shoulder to see Argent with his feet planted, a crossbow with blunted arrows in his hands as he stared down Scott and I. I sighed as Scott shifted to stand shoulder to shoulder with me. Argent grinned, then continued.

"You got out reasonably quickly. But you lingered, instead of leaving as fast as possible. Which means you now have a different problem to face: getting past me."

I rolled my eyes and sighed, even as I felt Scott tense beside me. I mirrored him after a moment, squaring up with him to face down the hunter. Of course he couldn't let us just celebrate the small win without adding another challenge to deal with. Still, as long as it was me and Scott, I knew we could take on anything Argent or anybody else wanted to throw at us.

And after the frustrations of his training this afternoon, I didn't completely mind the opportunity to throw a few punches at Argent, anyway.

****************

Now, he believes him.

Just a little bit.

“Wilson,” House groans when he finally flops down onto his bed, face buried in his pillow.

“Yes?” Wilson asks, smiling softly.

“You gon’ stay with me?”

Wilson hesitates, lips parting softly, unsure. They’ve done this dance before. One of them invites the other into their bed, and they end up sleeping together in multiple ways that night, until the next morning, when they pretend it never happened.

“I dunno, Greg. You need your rest.”

House huffs, glancing over at him with a frown. “Please?”

It takes everything in him not to give in. Wilson shakes his head, smiling apologetically. “I’ll be on the couch. Yell if you need anything.”

House doesn’t get the chance to respond because the other man leaves the room immediately, shutting the door behind him.

On a regular day, House is pretty sensitive to rejection, even if he doesn’t show it. But on a day like this, when he’s drunk off his ass and more vulnerable than he’s ever been? The rejection feels like Wilson just stabbed him in the stomach, ripped open his chest, and tore out his heart.

House tugs the blankets over himself, willing his eyes not to start tearing up. Alas, he doesn’t always get what he wants, a fact exemplified by the tears dripping onto his pillow. But at least he stays quiet, the only sound being his shaky, unsteady breaths. He curls into himself, grasping the blanket as he tugs it impossibly tighter around himself.

His shoulders shake and shudder, but he doesn’t make a sound, falling into the weird sort of comfort that the tears give him.

Next thing House knows, he’s waking up in the morning with a pounding migraine behind his eyes and nausea rising up his throat. He groans, sitting up slowly, head on his knees, holding his breath- as if that would get rid of the nausea.

“Wilson,” He groans, pressing the heels of his palms against his eyes. It doesn’t take long for his bedroom door to creak open.

“Hey, what’s going on?” Wilson asks, stepping closer to him, but not quite close enough.

“I’m dying,” House deadpans, since it should be obvious that he has a hangover. Apparently, it’s not, though.

“Yeah, yeah. Need some Advil?”

House grunts, nodding, taking sharp, ragged breaths, fighting the waves of nausea. But it doesn’t help.

At least Wilson notices. Hell, he notices before House even realizes that it’s not going away. Unfortunately, he also tugs House to his feet and nearly drags him to the bathroom.

“C’mon, you’re not gonna throw up all over your carpet. It’ll be a pain in the ass to clean.”

It takes what feels like hours for the nausea to subside, keeping his forehead pressed against the toilet bowl the entire time.

Wilson drifts in and out of the bathroom, making sure to check on him often.

When House finally gets up and drudges into the kitchen, Wilson’s cooking, the aroma of pancakes fills the air. He plops down on the couch, not saying a word.

It stays silent, even when Wilson hands him a plate and sits down on the couch next to him. Neither of them reaches for the remote. House doesn’t even comment on the pancakes or how Wilson made his favorite.

Complete silence.

Eventually, House gets fed up.

“You’re not speaking.”

Wilson huffs, rolling his eyes. “Neither are you.”

“Because you’re not!”

“When has that ever stopped you?”

House falters, mouth opening and just as quickly shutting.

“Yeah, thought so.”

House finishes eating first, immediately getting up to take care of his dishes. And then he makes his way back to his room, slamming the door shut. Wilson startles, eyes widening; he never does that, he never leaves like this.

Wilson quickly finishes eating and heads to House’s room, knocking.

“Go away.”

“No, not until you tell me what the hell is wrong.”

The door swings open, and Wilson comes face to face with House, his eyes red and cheeks damp.

House doesn’t know what to say. Sure, he’d been going over it again and again in his head, but once there’s the chance to actually say them, they disappear.

So he does the next best thing. He pulls Wilson in by the lapels of his shirt and slams his lips against his. Wilson gasps, hands against House’s chest, not exactly pushing away, but not leaning in either.

House pulls back, eyes wide, when he realizes how frozen Wilson is. His heart pounds, panic rising up.

“I’m just gonna… Bye, House. I’ll see you.” Wilson mumbles, turning away. House watches him as he leaves, and the moment the front door shuts, he chokes out a sob, collapsing against the wall, arms around himself.

When he goes to work the next day- early, mind you- Wilson isn’t there. His office is dark, and throughout the day, his door stays shut.

This repeats for the next week, and House only gets more impatient and regretful. He tries to call Wilson countless times, every time resulting in him getting stabbed in the chest by the sound of Wilson’s voice message and the beep that comes after.

A month goes by. Cuddy asks him where Wilson is so many times.

He never has the answer.

Eventually, the office grows dusty, and House stops going in there.

He fills the space with Vicodin, increasing his dosage again and again, reversing all progress that he had made before. He gets worse and worse until he’s merely a shell of the man he was.

The next time he sees Wilson, it’s late at night, a month and a half after the last time he’d seen him. He’s cleaning out his office, shoving all of his things into boxes. House peeks in, but doesn’t say a word. They meet eyes, and Wilson looks ready to say something, but House turns and walks away.

“I’ll be seeing you, I guess.”

That’s the last thing Wilson hears from House.

Its the last thing he ever hears from the man before he shows up at the funeral home a few weeks later, regret building in his chest, choking him.

They told him it was an accidental overdose.

Wilson doubts it.

Two weeks later, he’s diagnosed with cancer.

Terminal. He knows that word all too well. 

He’s told he has five months.