PALIMPSEST.

Sometimes, Clint wondered if he wasn't so much a lover to Bucky as a living sex toy, like one of those lifelike vinyl doll-boyfriends sold out of the back of lingerie shops he could simply get his jollies on and then shove back in a cedar chest so nobody knew the twisted ways he liked to get himself off. He knew, deep down, there was no way Bucky could love him -- who the fuck could love Clint Barton, almost as famous as Tony Stark for his ill luck in romantic entanglements. He certainly belonged to an exclusive club of 'lovers who'd tried to kill him', but Clint often mused that Bucky ought to get it over with already and just save them both the hassle. Because Bucky never came to him unless he wanted something, unless he had some craving that needed satisfaction.

And God help him, Clint could never say no.

Case in point: he'd just been minding his own business. Working out in the late night hours, when he could tune his hearing aids to his phone to listen to some music and focus on his routine. Had just finished up a set on the rowing machine and was in the locker room, debating between finishing with a run around the grounds or a few laps in the pool, when a hand crept around his middle and dove straight down his pants. He'd flailed for a moment, trying to tap the settings over on his hearing aids, because he could feel Bucky's voice where his lips were pressed against the back of his neck, but couldn't understand the words. When he finally succeeded in tuning them back in to reality, two and two -- the hand down his pants and the supple words -- came together as easily as he found himself pushed against the lockers.

Pinned, Bucky's hips against his own, both their pants hitched down and the assassin's hand -- flesh, never metal -- gently stroking over both hardened cocks.

It's impossible to overstate how far Dane has come. It wasn't long ago that he couldn't even accept his own sexuality. Now look at him, encouraging his boyfriend to put on a borderline slutty skirt so they can have a night on the town.

Lucas can understand that Bucky doesn't like to be prodded and checked. He doesn't like it as well, and he knows better than impose in his motions, although he grunts his annoyance whenever his partner flinches away.

"Big words coming from someone who's bleeding like that..." he mumbles, reaching for the bandana around his neck to fashion some kind of bandage for Bucky. It will have to do until someone more skilled in field medicine can patch him up.

' what, i don't look hot? ' it's just a joke, a sordid brand of humor typically employed by known jokesters among their colleagues--a red-and-purple hawkeye, nursing a busted nostril and a litany of smart remarks, or the disjointed thought streams that poured out of deadpool's gnarled mouth. bucky doesn't have it in him to tote around his baggage behind walls of ironic humor, always serious--

A discontent rumble rolled through Victor; the slight vibrations of a growl as his hands reflexively flexed, and his claws unsheathed. Black crescents, mean and sharp. Pa used to cut 'em off at the knuckle and the scrutiny scratches at an old scab, that's never quite healed for Victor. But he learned to be good for these kind of inspections. Roll over, show his belly, earn his little bit of affection.

So, he lets James.

a soft intake of air follows victor's grumbled promise, somewhere between amusement and elation, a sickness that slumbered in them longing for a bit of pain. yet, their inquisition ends, turning his hand over instead to affectionately smooth their natal fingers across the knob of his wrist, the sturdy oak of his digits. ' i wanted to see what muscle controls them. ' their interest had been purely academic, yet not so pressing they would've harmed him.

For all his untamed, animalistic tendencies, Logan was still human, capable of controlling his baser instincts. And often this was how he went about his days; he didn't devolve to a ravening, slavering beast unless the situation absolutely called for it. To protect his people he'd unleash the beast, bathe in the blood of anyone who would dare threaten those he cared about and the life they'd built. The violence was the hardest to contain, though; others he could simply ignore, for the most part. He ate red meat because he could pick it up from the grocery store, there was no need to hunt down his own meals unless it was for fun.

His sex drive, he could stifle almost entirely. A randy old beast wasn't the kind of role model those young mutants needed around.

Except now, he had Bucky. Rarely did Logan meet someone with as insatiable lust, who seemed to always be ready, willing, and eager when Logan showed the slightest interest. Who didn't mind if he loosened the leash he kept on himself now and then…

Who'd spent an entire day teasing him and was now getting exactly what he wanted.

Lazy Sunday mornings were everything to them, now; as long as the communicators stayed quiet, it was the one day of the week that duty wasn't the primary concern. Even a man as powerful, as steadfast as Steve, needed his rest and recovery time. Sunday mornings were for sleeping in late, for ignoring the pressures of public life and being together. Most mornings they simply lay in bed and let the morning light filter through the windows. Some mornings, though, dawned with something a little less than lazy on the horizon.

The moment he'd spied the spark of stirring consciousness, he'd allowed his body to follow the pace his mind had taken. A snaking hand traipses Steve's bare abdomen, deliberate and slow where it rises and falls, to land squarely on the subtle height of his hardening cock. Morning glories, the fellas in the gulag used to call them.

There is a painful joke Bucky wants to make, sifting about his ribs, about being an early riser and all. It dies in favor of nourishing his lust.

a muscle in her jaw twitches at the pressure of the tourniquet, the tight curl of his bionic fingers. if there was a medal for the pain olympics, natasha would be a world record holder at this point; she can almost smell the sterile scent of an old operating room, the copper twang of her own blood while she was cut open, paralyzed and awake. but there's no prize for hiding her discomfort, and she lets her lips grimace as her brain works to process the burning sear.

james has always had a soft spot, when it comes to her.

with the cleaner of her two hands, she reaches out, cups the side of his face and runs her thumb along the barely-there stubble at his jaw.

"i've had much worse. a couple of stitches aren't going to break me."

but natasha has always had a soft spot, too, when it comes to james and their star-crossed history.

the tourniquet will ache, but it was better than weeping blood.

seating himself at her feet as any good subject to monarch, or worshipper to bloody god, james quietly feels about her personal items--taking care not to linger, as if it was an invasion of privacy--until he traces the outline of the whistle, familiar plastic vertices ablated from the confines of the provisional bag.

he inserts the narrow brown cannister into the intake port, stretching up to hand natasha the primed mouthpiece. ' i never liked these. just be careful. covering the dilutor hole'll make it work quicker. ' and like that, he's back at work: the small pair of angled, titanium medical grade scissors slit through the tourniquet. a little bottle of povidone iodine scents the open air, liberally smoothed across the ragged trench. antiseptic, portably small, non-stinging. better than isopropyl alcohol, at least.