#fallenau3

God her feet hurt, Kitty grumbled as she walked back to her two room apartment. The sun was coming up, and all the speakeasy bartenders, bouncers, and....dancers were stumbling home. The...”working class” had come to take their piece of the take, and it always gave her the creeps. Capone could talk all he wanted about being a man of the people, but everyone knew he was a killer. Kitty also helped with the books so it would be her ass on the line. 

Unlike most of the dancers she worked with, Kitty wasn’t fresh off the bus from Montana, she had grown up right outside of Chicago and knew just what she was getting into, thank you very much! And she wasn’t looking to find a husband among the bathtub gin drunk grabby bastards. She really wanted to take her heels off but her feet would freeze. She sighed and pulled out her ponytail, letting her hair fall down her back. And it gave her the added advantage of being able to look around, this wasn’t the best neighborhood.

“Hey gorgeous. Long time no see.”

It’s sad that you think you’ll be victorious.

James Barnes was known for his charm. He was sweeter than taffy, everyone in Brooklyn knew it too. Sometimes his daddy did raise him right for he could be a gentleman when needed. He helped carry in groceries or helped clean up the yards. His father could be rough at times, but he believed it made him stronger in the end. 

He wasn’t scared to give a punch when needed Steve brought that out of him. The poor kid never knew when to back down and Bucky knew those jerks deserved it. That was how their friendship started because no one should be picked on because of how they looked or if they were different. His momma made sure Bucky knew that before her passing. 

Bucky met Regan later on in school. He somehow didn’t have a class with Steve and he was forced to make a friend. He picked her more on the fact that she was the only one who wasn’t as scared as everyone else. Bucky had only gotten into one fight and then he was known all throughout the school as the bad boy. It was stupid, but he didn’t need anyone else besides Steve. Well, and Regan if she wanted to be considered a friend. 

As the years went by Regan and Bucky’s friendship turned into a little bit more. He wouldn’t call it going steady because he wasn’t really the settling down type and he never asked. But they have been going on a few dates and maybe it would have turned into something more. Maybe if he didn’t get enlisted with the military once Pearl Harbor was attacked. His father was in the military so it made sense for Bucky to be part of it as well. That was somewhat true. He didn’t completely want to be part of the war, but this was his duty. Life would have to come after. 

This wasn’t the first time Bucky had been sent to the principal’s office. This also wasn’t the first time he had gotten in trouble. “Now, Mr. Barnes, you know the rules. Three strikes and you’re out, buddy.” Bucky didn’t look at the princpal and kept flidding with his fingers. “I’m going to call your father. You will wait outside and I better see you still there once your father and I are finished.” Bucky nodded before sulking his way out to the chairs. He was in real trouble now. Any call to his father was never good. 

He traced the veins on his hands as he waited. His father didn’t even look at him when he came about, his coat blowing in the wind his own feet created. He was angry, Bucky noticed by the way his face was tight and controlled. Rage was the perfect deadly sin Bucky had figured out. The talk wasn’t long and soon he was pulled from the chair and struggling to keep up with his father’s quick pace. “James, what the hell do ya think you’re doing?” It was the only thing his father said in the car and wouldn’t take silence for an answer. 

“Pa, it wasn’t even my fault. That jerk Tommy was pushing Steve. What was I supposed to do, huh?” Bucky knew his father wouldn’t understand. No one touched Steve and this Tommy fella thought he could. His father just sighed and stayed quiet the way home. Maybe he did understand or at least understood the friendship his son and Steve shared. 

The walked into the house, taking off their shoes and setting jackets in the closet. “After dinner, we’re going to talk ‘bout this school problem. You are failing classes and now getting into more fights --”

“Dad, that’s not true! Tommy was my only fight, I swear!” Bucky wasn’t going to say anything about the usual alley ass-kicking he did on Steve’s behalf. The dumb kid didn’t know when to back down. It wasn’t any of his fault. He was just protecting his best friend. 

Peter knew that the war was the only way that he was going to climb out of the poverty he was in. Orphaned, alone in the city, and without even so much as an inheritance to his name, the only way he was ever going to be able to take care of himself was if he fought.

And so fight he did.

He’d found himself a position in the army that was of some consequence. Peter had discovered a better way to make saltpetre -- to make it keep longer and work better, so they could use less -- and that discovery had led to a quick promotion from third assistant to the Quartermaster to the General’s ‘pet scientist’.

When he got home tonight, he was going to have to burn a candle to keep working on the latest thing he was working on -- a way of refining the water around the camps faster than just boiling it. Boiling water took time and firewood, and often the army had neither to spare.

Tonight, though, he had been dragged to a high-society party in the City. Peter knew neither what to do or what to wear, so he put on his best uniform and hoped for the best. He stood to the side with some of the other soldiers, rolling his eyes at Burr and Hamilton’s antics, and quietly sipped a glass of something strong.