#softspace fics

Bucky absolutely loved days like this. He woke up to your arms practically strangling him as you clinged to him in your sleep. He laid awake for nearly a hour and a half before he felt you lift your head, dilated eyes searching for him.

His smile grew when he realized you had woken up regressed and he was surely gonna have the best time being papa today. There was nothing better.

He helped you set up in your little play pin with all your toys, giggling away as you played with some of your favorite toys. He sat inside the pin with you, watching you play in your own world. He enjoyed when your imagination took you somewhere he couldn't join you, as he could watch you from out here and smile as you did whatever you wanted to.

His phone dings as you continue to play, the jingle correlating to only one person. Steve. He picks the phone up, checking the messages and responding before looking back up at you.

When he looks back up at you he catches you having one of your stuffed animals ears in your mouth, teething on it while you continue to play. He sighs before getting up and grabbing your teether from the nightstand near the couch.

"Hey, hey. Your bunny doesn't like when you bite its ears yeah? How about you chew on this?" He replaces the bunny's ear with the teether and sets the bunny to the side.

You take to the teether and he sighs gratefully, glad to have escaped that mess. He walks over to the kitchen, grabbing your favorite sippy cup and a cup for himself before filling them both with juice.

He knew you had a minor oral fixation when you were small, it's why after a few months of you regressing he had collected a entire drawer of teethers for when you wanted to suck or bite something.

He walks back out to the living room, setting his cup down on the entertainment center before heading back over to you with your sippy cup. He sees that the teether didn't last long, and that your poor bunny ended up taking some more damage to the ear. He sets your sippy down infront of you, which causes you to drop the bunnies ear and take the sippy cup excitedly.

He hoped that the sippy cup would distract you enough to forget to try and eat the bunny again, and succeed it did. He sat down on the couch across from the playpin, drinking his own juice and finding some old tunes to listen to while you and him had a calm morning.

For about five minutes.

Once you finished the sippy, you had decided to add some blabble dialogue to the current fight scene between your dolls, the bunny staying safely beside you. Once the fight had concluded you ended up bored of the dolls and grabbed your bunny back, chewing on the ear as you crawled over to the edge of the playpin, hoping for bucky to take you out of it.

"Oh baby, your poor bunny! Here why don't we go get a different teether?" Bucky picks you up from the playpin, walking to your nursery.

He opens the drawer of teethers, handing you some, but all of them just make you frustrated, the texture being off, or just not what you wanted. You bury your face into the crook of buckys neck, mumbling something incoherent.

"What was that baby? Can you tell papa what you want?"

You shrug before just mumbling something about 'room' and something else he couldn't quite catch.

"Room? Papa's and babys room?"

He walks to your shared room, and the answer to your blabbles stares directly at him. He shakes his head at himself before he walks over to the night stand and picks up your pacifier, placing it gently between your lips.

You smile behind the shield of the paci and snuggle into him, happy to now have your comfort item safely in your mouth.

"You weren't teething were you? Hmm? You just wanted your pacifier. Silly baby. Okay how about we go make some pancakes and watch cartoons all day in our jammies?"

Your head shoots up from his neck, excitement shining in your eyes.

"Yeah? Yeah. Okay lets go do that."

Bucky and you walk out of your bedroom, set to the kitchen to make breakfast, and do the thing you both love the most. Spending time together.

You thought you were better at hiding things than this, there was no way he caught on. The more you pace around your hotel room the more your heart raced. You mumble to yourself over and over, trying to piece together how Reid could have figured it out. You knew he was a genius, but you knew how to hide your regression, you know it wasn't that noticeable? Right?

The last few months race through your head as you continue to pace, worry running through your veins. What if he tells Hotch? Morgan? How would you explain this to them?

You weren't exactly sure if Reid completely caught on, or if he knew what Age regression was, it wasn't something you had told anybody, ever. The unknown of it all just made it so much worse too. You didn't want to just ask him because if he didn't know then it would just be awkward explaining, but if he did know? What would he do knowing he was right?

It felt like you couldn't get the team to listen once Reid started doing more tasks for you, the looks the team gave as he would help you do tasks you used to do solo just made the whole situation worse.

You knew how much cases that were darker than anyone could ever imagine affected you, thats why no matter what mission was occuring you always got a room to yourself, so you could quietly watch cartoons or color and decompress each night. So you could focus and be better at your job and become a better profiler.

No matter how much you want to scream at the man whos room is across from yours all you can think about is the little things he's done for you, silently, making sure your safe and taken care of over the last few months too. How sweet it's felt for you to have someone step in for little tasks that just got frustrating sometimes.

— flash back —

"BAU team, round table." Hotch calls over the office floor as he marches over to the door that you found all to familiar.

You grab your file that JJ had given you 30 minutes prior, a sickening feeling washing over you. This case wasn't a clean cut, it was messy, scary, and downright sickening.

You're the last to join the table, Garcia begins the introduction to the case, the whole groups attention on her. As the photos appear on the screen your stomach turns, most cases like this didn't hit this way, but this one was just so violating.

The debrief continues on for about 30 minutes before hotch stands up, looking over everyone as he decides where the team will all go to accomplish this case.

"Morgan, JJ, Rossi, Prentiss and I will fly out to Milwaukee. Reid, Garcia and (Y/L/N) will stay here and collect as much evidence on the victims, their families and any connections. We're going in practically empty handed until then. Wheels up in 30." Hotch says.

Reid, Garcia and you all nod and head out together afterwards, Garcia heading to her dungeon while you and Reid head to the smaller meeting room to set up for research.

On the way there Reid picks up some snacks from the kitchen, grabbing some for him and grabbing your favorites that he had stashed for days where you and him worked together.

He strolls into the meeting room where you had already put most of the crime scene photos onto the clear board as well as laid a few of the autopsy reports on the table. He sets down the snacks he grabbed before coming over and helping you set up the rest of the way.

"No- Wait, doesn't that belong here. The London family didn't have gunshot wounds." Reid gently grabs the picture from your hands, scanning it.

You look at him confused before looking at the photo again. You grab a different photo and put it side by side before recognizing the wound pattern had progressively started changing between each family.

Garcia walks in with a face of pure disgust carrying more files.

"That's because the London family wasn't the first family. Apparently."

You walk over to Garcia, opening the file of boxes before looking up at Reid.

"There's at least 20 more files in here. Garcia, what all did you find?" You ask.

As Garcia rambles on the pattern in the case, your mind grows fuzzy, the realization that this case was so much more sickening than you originally realized making you want to actually vomit.

"And now that I have those images burned in my head, I'm going to go stare at penguins for 15 minutes." Garcia hurries out the door, leaving you and Reid back at it.

Hours pass by of you and Reid placing pieces together, trying to make sense of whats going on before you get a call from Hotch on your computer infront of you.

You pick up the call, Reid joining you in the frame as you both ramble over eachother to explain all you found to Hotch.

Reaching for the chips that Reid brought you earlier, you attempt to open them as Reid explains the murder pattern to the team on the other side of the laptop.

You quickly get frustrated as the bag decides it won't open and go to put it back before Reid takes the bag from your hands. He opens it in one go before handing it to you, not pausing a single second in the midst.

Hotch thanks him for the information before hanging up. You look at him for a split second longer than you should before muttering a quick thanks and going back to work.

You two spend another few hours gathering the last few pieces of evidence before heading to the jet and flying over to meet the team in Miluakee.

—— End Flashback——

That was just him being nice right? It couldn't have meant anything. He just saw you struggling and decided to help. Thats all it could have been right? I mean sure that wasn't the only thing hes done, but there's no reason to assume otherwise.

You couldn't help but fall down the rabbit hole of micro-analyzing every interaction he's had with you, hoping to put together if he knew or not. If anyone did.

—Flashback—

You step outside your hotel door, the new case after Milwaukee ending with a locked up criminal and a headache worse than a hangover. You had next to zero sleep and no time to indulge in even a episode of your favorite cartoon the entire time, constantly getting woken up to new info from Garcia, or from Hotch needing the team asap as the killer continued to kill.

You tiredly drag your suitcase behind you, praying to blink and be home in your own bed. Your thoughts begin to fog as you continue down the hallway, only snapping out of it when you feel your bag being gently taken from your hand.

You quickly spin and look at the person, nearly punching them before realizing it's Reid and before you even attempt to argue, he give the look that you know all too well. 'Don't even try' was all that look said, and you just accepted fate, for tonight at least.

You and him make small talk on the way to the elevator, you attempt to force yourself in the biggest mindset you can, hoping your eyes and slightly slurred speech could all be excused to tiredness.

Even though you insist on taking back the bag, he continues to take your bag all the way to the car, as well as taking it and helping you put it on the plane before letting you take the couch and get some sleep.

You wouldn't be so bothered by it, if you hadn't caught the weird glance of Morgan. His eyebrow raising at Reid while Reid gave him a "What?" face in return.

You go to press Morgan but before you even get a word out exhaustion hits the kill switch in your mind and you decide sleeps more important, you'll figure whatever else later.

—End Flashback—

The next job after that more things started to happen, Reid would constantly tag along with you, watching you closely, he'd always pick the room across from yours, making sure that if you needed anything he could be there.

Once, you ordered pizza to your room and before you could even grab it from the door, Reid was already picking it up and brining it into your room. You forgot he had asked for a key ealier when rooms were assigned.

When he asked for a extra key to your room everyone gave you a look, all eyes giving a unspoken question before Reid turned around rambling on about "the unsub likes individuals that look like them, I want to make sure in case something goes down that someone has a key to their room."

It didn't feel like it was because the unsub had a knack for people like you, it was like he was trying to break a wall down. Trying to get under your skin to know your secret.

You both ended that night siting on your floor watching a weird Rom-Com and eating more pizza than you probably should have. Yet you felt more free and relaxed than you had in weeks.

Little things like that would happen more often, him checking in on you at night, making sure to have your favorite snacks when you inevitably craved them. The look he'd give someone if he caught a small pout on your lips, although you didn't know when that one started. You caught it once or twice, but he normally would look away from you before glaring at whoever upset you.

The final straw for making you reaize he migth have caught on is when he bought you a piece of merch from your favorite cartoon. You had never once told him you watched the cartoon, but he knew, somehow. Was it the genius in him? Had he seen it in your tabs? You swore you never left that open.

What killed you inside the most was that the team caught on to Reid's antics too, it wasn't like he was really.. good at subtle.

He'd hand you your safe foods before you even asked while infront of Morgan, or glance at Emily when she would say something a tad too harsh, even without realizing it. Hotch caught onto how he'd sit as close to you as he could if you slept on the plane, a protection tactic. Even if it was just the team around you.

It was like Reid could sniff the regression rolling off you like it was infused into your perfume. It terrified you that you had no clue if he was just waiting for you to crack, or if he truly knew what you had been hiding.

The endless worrying exhausts you out, the night ended with you snoring on the hotels couch, your thumb between your lips and worrys covering you like a thick heavy blanket.

The next day your awoken by Morgan doing his normal bang on the door to wake each member of the team up before strolling down the hall. You get up relatively quickly, gathering yourself and getting your items ready for the hopefully, last day in Arizona.

You all climb into the 3 cars, Hotch, Morgan,and JJ in one, Rossi and Emily in another, you and Reid in the last one. You wanted to argue, change cars, and hope for the best, but you knew that would only raise more questions. So you all climbed in and took of to the station.

Once there you all climb out of the cars and scatter inside making sure to check new evidence and clue together the new puzzle pieces.

The day goes on smoothly, and ends with the case being closed, and another psycho being imprisoned.

The team collects by the car, all in agreeance to get some sleep and head home in the morning. You all bid goodnights to eachother before going into the same cars as the morning and heading back to the hotels.

Once back in your hotel you decide to take a hot shower, cleaning yourself off, and getting into your favorite pajamas, ready for a night of freedom from the worries of the world.

That is until you hear a gentle knock on your door, the one you had learned to recognize so easily. You open the door to see Reid awkwardly standing on the other side, a hoodie and sweatpants covering him.

"Hi Reid, you okay?" You ask, the door only partly ajar.

"I just uh- I wanted to see if you wanted to watch a movie?" He asks

"If not that's okay! I don't- I don't want to intrude if you don't want to."

You chuckle to yourself before opening the door wider, allowing the tall man to walk into your room before you close the door and sigh.

"Reid?"

"Yeah?"

"This isn't about a movie, is it?"

Reid spins on his heel, looking at you with a minorly shocked face. His face drops as he realizes he's not being sly and looks down from you.

"No, not exactly."

"Reid, I get the worry especially when we finish cases like this, but I don't need to be watched over all the time."

"I know that, and-and I don't mean for it to come across that way at all. I just worry about you. I see the way you look at the photos or the way you glance away when its something that you didn't expect. I just get worried you hide more than- well than I think anyone realizes. Did you know that-"

"Reid-"

"I mean it's common for those who grew up in a certain way to-"

"Reid!" Your voice catches his attention.

His eyes look at you, a emotion running through them you can't read, something you only wish to get a answer for.

"Reid. I can handle myself, I promise. It's not that I don't appreciate the kindness, but when it's done infront of the team I-. It's so hard to get them to take me seriously when I have a idea when your handing me chips you've had in your pocket for me, or-or opening my water bottle and I just.." You ramble on.

All the questions, the motives, the eyes, the stares, the conversations you know have happened behind closed doors flood from your mouth, leaving Reid standing there, his eyes searching for you to tell him to leave, or for him to back off completely and stop pressing.

Your rambles end when he looks at you, and its like the words fall out without permission.

"I know about your age regression."

Your eyes grow wide as you pause mid sentence, looking at Reid. Your eyes filling with tears of shock and fear.

Reid's eyes widen as he realizes he just admitted he knew something you had never told him.

"I-I mean I just- It all just- It clicked! And I didn't know what else to do, I could see it in your eyes, and your mannerisms! The way your eyes get a gloss to them when we get to the end of the night and you get to go hide- and I just wanted to help! I just wanted you to know I knew and I could help and-"

"…Help? That's… all?"

Reid stops as he hears your cracked voice ask a question he didn't expect. I mean what else would he have done with the knowledge? You were his teammate, his friend, someone he cherished.

"Reid it was like no one saw past the snacks and the help and the-the babying.."

Reid's face falls as he realizes his attempts to help you has hurt you more than helped. He walks over to you, giving you a hug that just solidifies the water works. You end up hugging him back, months worth of pent up anger, concern, worry, and just exhaustion all catch up at once.

"I'm sorry, I shouldn't have just taken charge and I don't mean to be the reason you get seen differently." He says quietly.

He rubs your back as he slowly guides you both to sit on your bed, rocking you as best as he could once your sitting, trying to help you keep stable breathing.

"I didn't know how to just ask you without it being weird, and when I got you that t-shirt it just make me completely realize and understand and all I wanted to was help that's all.."

As your tears slow, you push yourself off of Reid's shoulder, wiping the still falling tears. You look at him and see the genuine care and worry in his eyes.

You try to stay angry, you want to just be absolutely furious at how much he has affected your working relationship with the team that would take time to re-build, but you just couldn't.

"It's okay, I get that..I get that you just meant good and didn't mean to harm anything.." You trail off.

Reid looks at you, waiting for you to push him away, to tell him off, and for him to leave. You look at the floor before your shoulders sag and you sniffle.

"Just please don't do it in front of the others as much anymore.. If you want to help we can try and do some stuff together, but I don't want anything fast or rushed."

Reids eyes light up as he hugs you again, grateful that even though you didn't exactly get to tell him on your own accord, you still let him in. The wall came down and you would both be able to have a chance to let whatever this was bloom.

You giggle slightly as you hug him back, a weight lifted off your chest, and your breathing feeling lighter.

Instead of a silly rom-com and jokes that went way over your head when regressed, you spend this night showing Reid your favorite episodes from your favorite show, eating pizza, and enjoying each other's company.

"Hey Natasha?" You walk into her bedroom, closing the door behind you as Nat looks up at you.

"Yeah? What's up?"

Natasha moves over on her bed, leaving you some room to sit next to her. Your face has a look on it that worries Natasha, but she doesn't want to make you uncomfortable, so she lets you go at your own pace for whatever you're going to tell her.

"I... I need to tell you something, but I don't know if I'm ready for the others to know." You say, sitting next to her.

"Lips are sealed. Your safe. What's up?" She outstretches her hand, giving you the option to hold it if you'd like to.

You do.

You knew this was going to be a tough subject, bringing up your regression to Natasha was not something you were sure was going to ever happen, but she had been someone you could trust with everything. Everything in you begged for someone to know, to let someone in. You figured Natasha was the easiest to start with, and maybe later on tell more.

You explained for about 30 minutes about your regression to Natasha, her face going from confusion to understanding. She hadn't heard of regression before, but she knew how big this was for you to have hid this for years since knowing her.

She welcomed your regression in with open arms, making sure you knew that if you ever wanted to, she'd love to be there for you if you needed her. It was a simple conversation, nothing to detailed being expressed, yet. You just wanted to tell her, that was it. Everything else came with time and that was okay.

You eventually left her room, going back to your room to pick up on a hobby you had started earlier before going to talk to Natasha.

You felt lighter, better, more seen in a sense. You knew it would take a while and a lot of conversations before you regressed Infront of Natasha.

The thing though was that when you talked to Natasha, there wasn't just her listening.

Vision had originally come to talk to you about something tony mentioned about in regard to a mission but was confused to find you out of your room. You didn't normally leave your room in the afternoon unless called out, it wasn't a set thing, just something he had noticed.

He searched around for you, and when he heard your voice coming through the door of Natasha's room, he stood next to it. He didn't exactly mean to 'eavesdrop' but when you started talking about your regression, something in him just didn't want to move.

He ends up spending extra time and attention to learning about age regression over the next few days, just in case something happened, just in case you needed anything.

One day it was just you and him back at the tower, he had stayed back when he found out it was just going to be you in the tower. You knew he was in the tower, but you didn't really care, seeing as he normally didn't bother you if you were in your room.

As the day progressed and the sun started to set, your mind actively regressed, the way the sky shined making your eyes gleam and your mind just so excited to play, to be little for a while.

Your toys eventually were scattered on your floor, you excitedly played games with your dolls and stuffies, giggling and talking away. You hadn't noticed when vision knocked on your door, checking in on you after he didn't get a response from you about dinner.

He opens the door quietly, light from the living room creeps in. The change in lighting catches your attention and you look up at vision, pure fear and shock etched on your face. You weren't exactly prepared for this.

"Hey, I was going-" Vision pauses.

He takes in the state of your room before he looks at you, acknowledging your dilated eyes and your breathing escalating. He didn't want to freak you out, so he did what he could to act casual about everything and let you know he truthfully didn't mind.

"I was not sure if you'd like for me to cook you something or order you take-out. Would you like some mac and cheese? Do you want a 'safe food'?" He asks.

Your face lights up at the thought of food, spilling out what you'd like to vision as he mentally catalogs things you like when regressed.

"Okay. I'll order that for you. Do you want me to come play with you when I am finished?"

You look at him mildly confused, did he know already? Had you told him and forgot?

"You know age regress'on?" You mumble out, confused.

"Yes, and I think it is quite alright you handle your feelings that way. I would like to be able to help you if that's alright?"

You nod, the feeling of two people now knowing settling in.

Vision leaves your room, gently closing the door behind him. The click of the door finalizes that feeling of confusion and you sit there on your floor confused. You weren't upset, but you surely weren't expecting vision to be the next one to find out about your regression. Or even know about it in general.

Vision comes back in a few minutes later, sitting near your small dollhouse you would hide behind your clothes in your closet. Your mind although scared, was buzzing with excitement. A new friend, new possibilities, and maybe more confidence in your little side.

You two spent the rest of the night playing dolls and eating food before vision helped you pick out a pj set and tucked you in.

Even though it was a surprise for vision to be the one to first help take care of you, you absolutely adored it.

Once the door was closed for the night, toys carefully cleaned and stacked away, your mind drifts off into a slumber of dreams and adventures with a new character added.

Vision wasn't sure how you'd react to his help, or even him knowing, but he now knew that there was nothing he wouldn't do for you, big or little. You were now his responsibility to protect, even more so than before.

Tony, Clint and Natasha all rush in behind Steve as he carries you into Bruces lab, Steve lays you down on his table as bruce stops what he's working on and rushes over, concern etched onto his face.

"What happened??" He says as he looks over your unconcious body, your suit covering most of your vital areas. He visually scans for wounds or bruises, both his doctor side and caregiver side kicking in.

"I don't know! I just found them out cold as we were heading back from the mission. We drove straight here." Steve clambers out, his eyes looking over you just as concerned.

As the group starts to argue over what could have happened, you start to wake up, your head throbbing and your back hurting from something unknown. You open your eyes looking around to Steve and Natasha yelling at one another, Tony and Bruce trying to figure out what is going on with you, and Clint standing near you.

"Hey numbskulls! They're awake." Clint catches all their attentions.

"Woah, hey baby. What happened? Can you tell me what hurts?" Bruce immediately steps closer to you, looming over you, scanning your face for any signs of pain.

"Papa?" Your glossy eyes catch onto his concerned ones. He immediately starts telling the others to leave the room.

Bruce eventually shoos everyone out of the room, closing the window visibility and helping to get you into comfier clothes, checking you for wounds as he helps change you with his emergency little bag.

"Okay you have some bruising on your back baby, how's your head hun?" Bruce gently picks you up, sitting onto the table with you on his lap.

"Hurts still.." You mumble as you cling to his chest, snuggling into his warmth. His scent of light mint and lumber mixing with the chemicals he was using earlier.

He gently kisses your forehead before helping you snuggle into him more.

"I know baby, the medicine will kick in soon."

From the check up he did as he helped you get out of your suit, he knew it wasn't anything major and that you'd be okay. All you needed was for him to be there.

Bruce gently threads his fingers through your hair as your body relaxes into him. Both of yours breathing begin to match one another, and you both sigh contently.

Bruce wasn't a very open person, and he wasn't very sure when you had asked him to be your caregiver. The big green thing he turns into put a lot of weight on his shoulder when thinking about those decisions.

Yet as he holds you in his arms, the feeling of you breathing against him and your heartbeat thumping, makes it all worth it. Eventually he hears your breathing stabilize, and become more soft. He gently lifts your face from his neck as he looks your sleeping face.

He admires you as he thanks whatever brought you to him, whatever gave him the one thing that kept him going. He gets up with you still engulfed in his arms, grabbing his bag and heading out to the main lobby to head up to your twos shared floor in the tower.

The elevator dings, the cozy apartment you and Bruce share comes into sight as Bruce continues to carry you in. You stir slightly as your back aching makes it hard to stay comfortable while being held in the air.

"Shhh, I know baby I know, Ill get you to bed right now." Bruce softly whispers, throwing his go bag on the couch and carrying you to your shared bed. He gently lays you up near the headboard, your head beginning to stop throbbing as the medicine completely sets in. You whine as you feel the warmth of your papa leave.

"It's okay baby, I'm just gonna get into comfier clothes. Ill be right across the room" Bruce smiles lightly before completely moving from the bed to the closet.

It feels like forever before you feel the bed creek and your slowly moved under sheets and back to being engulfed in Bruce's arms.

You giggle tiredly as Bruce kisses your nose, settling in as well, exhaustion hitting him.

You both lay there in silence, enjoying the soft breathing of eachother as you both lull the other to sleep.

Bruce would eventually wake you up in a few hours to do a better evaluation, to make sure you were completely okay, but for now all he knew you needed was your papa. So that he was.