#formerlyfalcon

there was nothing like this.

joaquin had been in passenger planes and cargo planes before - hell he’d even flown in his fair share of fighter jets - but nothing on earth could compare to the falcon wings. sam had gotten permission from the air force to allow joaquin to test the wings at the airbase, given how closely monitored the space was - and despite his familiarity with the area and it’s severe lack of cool things to look at - the view from the air was unreal.

he was doing pretty damn good, all things considered, and joaquin couldn’t help but feel a bit proud of himself for getting a handle on the tech this quickly. on one particular flyby however, he could hear sam’s muffled yelling from the ground, but the wind whipping past his ears did a real good job of making it mostly unintelligible. something about ‘drag’ and ‘lift’ and ‘careful!’ - you know, flight lingo - and wait. what was that last one?

suddenly, the goggles felt a bit too tight on his face, and the wind a bit too harsh, joaquin taking a sharp left to circle back toward sam. unfortunately — the wings didn’t necessarily agree with him, and the sharp left turned into a sharp down, joaquin headed straight for a major league slide into the pavement below.

“shit, shit, shit!”

before he could react further and before sam could call out any lifesaving maneuvers, metal met concrete ( and flesh not soon after ), sending joaquin sprawling onto his back with the wings splayed out beneath him, finally coming to rest in a small patch of grass a few feet away from sam.

the goggles had been knocked off upon impact, his head having collided pretty firmly with the dense dirt before the subsequent roll and the grass deciding to embed much of itself in his hair. there was also a mighty strong burning sensation spread across his left forearm and stretching down onto the left side of his torso, but joaquin ignored that for now, instead scrambling to stand, but looking more like a turtle that had been flipped onto its shell.

That was a lot of blood.

Things were a bit of a blur after that realization hit him, and after what felt like a few seconds he was stumbling across a familiar tiled floor. He was glancing behind him, eyes struggling to focus as they followed the path of blood droplets back to the elevator where he came from. He blinked, hard, brows furrowing together before he opened he opened his eyes again with a groan.

Bucky knew where he was. Getting himself here hadn't even been a conscious thought— as soon as he found himself flat on his back on the pavement, ears ringing and nose broken and stomach slashed open, he knew he had to get himself somewhere.. not here. There were unanswered calls and texts from Val and the team waiting for him, practically burning a hole in his pocket, but he ignored them all and limped his way through the streets towards the only safe landing his rattled brain could think of.

"Shit.. I'm making a fuckin' mess.." He sucked in a sharp breath, keeping one arm wrapped over the gash on his abdomen as he started fumbling around for the key. Not his key, just the key. The one that he knew he shouldn't be using. The one that he desperately hoped Sam hadn't moved.

All he needed to do was rest for a bit. Clean himself up. Maybe slap on a bandage or two. He would be fine. Sam wouldn't have a clue. They could stay at arm's length, avoid any awkwardness. Bucky would be out before Captain America had any idea that he had been there. That would be best for the both of them.

"I just don't get how you can have the 'Avengers' without Captain America. That's like having a football team and no quarter back -- or basketball with no Lebron."

Well that went horribly. Bucky hadn't really expected that meeting to go well, but he had hoped that something good would have come out of it. Looking back, that was oddly optimistic of him. And truthfully he was glad that things didn't turn out worse.

There were still a few conversations happening in the room as they all began to disband— he could hear Yelena and Alexei mumbling about something that he knew he would have to deal with later, but that wasn't his focus at the moment. Bucky completely ignored Val, waiting for her to give up and leave the room while he kept an eye on who he really wanted to talk to.

As soon as Sam was standing, so was Bucky. For a moment he hesitated, wondering if he should simply let his friend go. Their last talk didn't exactly go as planned, and it was entirely possible that Bucky would screw things up even more by trying to make them better. He was good at that— it often felt like for every step forward he took, he inadvertently threw himself a step or two back. But he also had a hard time letting things go, and that stubbornness often got the best of him.

Bucky's feet were moving before he made the conscious decision to do anything, and he was heading straight for Sam. He wove his way around the crowd as they all made their way to the elevator, parting the small sea of people at a diagonal.