rekindleme | closed spar

Entry tags:

closed spar

Who: Steve Rogers and Bucky Barnes
Where: The gym
When: Morning of January 31st
Summary: Two super soldiers finally decide to spar against each other.
Warnings: Fighting?

If Steve was truly honest about everything, he would say that he was excited for this spar.

Sure, he had his doubts initially when Bucky first suggested the idea, but when he heard his friend's explanation, the soldier was all too ready to agree to it. This wasn't going to be a fight to the death or a situation where millions of lives were at stake. It was going to be a simple spar between two friends, to test their abilities and train so that they could fight together. They would learn each others' styles, be ready to take on HYDRA when they return home.

That was what Bucky wanted, he said so himself. The fact that Bucky wanted to fight with Steve to take down an old enemy made him happy. It was a feeling that he didn't get too often nowadays, but Bucky always seemed to be someone that drew that type of emotion from him. ~~Course he made him sad a lot too~~

Eager for the fight, Steve had arrived early at the gym and was standing near the sparring mat, already wrapping his hands in tape as he waited for Bucky to arrive.

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Bucky had been sincere when he said he'd wanted to spar with Steve in order to learn his fighting style. When they worked together earlier in the month, it made him realize how much he enjoyed working with the man; it felt right. Fighting was one of the few things he could say for certain he enjoyed, and the idea that he could share that with someone he trusted--truly trusted--was something of a revelation. He could do something he liked, something he wasn't trying out just because Steve suggested it, or because his past self liked it.

So he'd asked Steve, and he'd said yes after his explanation. He wasn't exactly one to show a lot of emotion, but he was excited as well. As excited as he could be, anyway.

The soldier wasn't exactly trained in the best safety measures to use while sparring, so he hadn't done anything like tape his hands before arriving, just wearing his leather jacket and some workout clothes. He stepped in and looked around before spotting his friend and heading towards him, wondering if they needed to set any rules. They should probably have something like that in place, even though the both of them could heal from most injuries.

Sparring against Bucky wasn't something he done a lot in the past, so he knew that this was something his friend actually wanted to do instead of just trying to emulate the person he used to be. Back then, he was too frail for Bucky to really go all out against and after the serum, he didn't really ask to fight against him.

Knowing that Bucky wasn't forcing himself to make Steve feel more comfortable made him happier now than the past few weeks they had together. Even a punch to the face wouldn't dampen his mood.

Steve smiled when he saw his friend, noting the simple outfit he was wearing. "Wanna wrap your hands, Buck?"

He hung his jacket nearby after shrugging it off, then rolled his shoulders to stretch them as he turned to Steve, looking at the bandages he was using. He'd already warmed up before arriving so that he'd be ready to go whenever Steve was, but hadn't thought he'd need to prepare himself otherwise.

"Dunno. What for?"

"Helps to protect your hands." Well, Steve supposed that wrapping his metal hand wouldn't do much good really. But he still had his right hand and Steve thought that he should at least offer him. It didn't look like Bucky was familiar with these kind of safety measures, although it wasn't surprising at all. HYDRA wouldn't care about those type of things.

He shook away those upsetting thoughts and smiled a little at him. "You don't have to, of course. Can go straight to sparring if you want."

After glancing down and pausing for a second, Bucky offered his hand to Steve. The captain probably thought it was important, and he didn't think there was any harm in trying, anyway.

"Go for it."

Not needing to be told twice, Steve started to wrap his hand with the tape. He looked content as he wrapped Bucky, but he was still very thorough with his work. He wasn't about to do a sloppy job now, especially if his friend wanted him to do this.

"Should be fine now." Steve said after a few moments, standing back a little as he looked at him.

He looked down at his hand once Steve was done, making a fist to test the flexibility. He supposed it was a good compromise between movement and protection.

Letting his hand fall to his side, he met Steve's eyes again.

"Any rules?"

Steve had a few rules in mind, but he didn't think that he needed to say the ones that popped up in his mind. No outside weapons, no killing. Yeah, definitely not. He trusted Bucky after all.

"None I can think of. You have any?"

Bucky wouldn't have been bothered by outlining even those basic requests. It would give him a sense of stability.

"Not anything?" he asked, a little surprised. Steve may have trusted Bucky, but he was still an assassin. The last time he sparred that he could remember at all, he broke both a guy's legs. "Should have something to stop the match, at least."

"Maybe stay away from dirty fighting. No hair pulling, you get the drift." Not that Steve was above that kind of fighting himself, but he kinda wanted to spar against Bucky without going that route. This wasn't a mission where he would pull all stops to get through.

"A safe word?" Steve asked. "Could just yell 'stop' too."

"Fair enough."

It was still good to have it said, though. And it was a good thing that Steve did decide to talk about what he had in mind, because...

"No dirty fighting," he repeated. "So what's clean?"

HYDRA didn't exactly... distinguish between types of close-combat tactics.

Guess he should've known that Bucky wouldn't know the difference between the different fighting tactics. HYDRA mostly likely just made him fight against whomever in order to make him stronger. He was probably forced to win at all costs and complete the mission.

"Any blows not aimed at the groin for one." Steve smiled a little, showing patience for his friend's questions. "Avoid scratching."

"I'm guessing no biting either," he said with a raised eyebrow. He was half-joking--biting wasn't something he was interested in, especially not with fighting Steve-but with him it was always hard to tell. He still didn't do humor very well.

He tried to think of anything else that might be considered "dirty," and he supposed that the intent wasn't to draw blood, so he'd avoid that. Steve mentioned the groin but didn't mention any of the other sensitive areas... He'd just have to hope the man wasn't leaving anything out.

Bucky glanced at the room before stepping back a few paces. The mat on the floor should be enough to keep them from accidental major injury.

"That it?"

"No biting." Steve wasn't too sure if Bucky was joking or not, so he might as well answer him. He could joke about things later with him, but now he wanted to be a little more serious since Bucky was trying to learn the rules of their spar.

"Nothing directed towards the eyes." Losing their vision would be pretty awful. Once he said that, Steve started to get into position on the mat. That should be enough rules.

Bucky nodded to acknowledge the last of the rules and settled into his stance, feet shoulder width apart and hands at his sides. He didn't move to attack, instead waiting for Steve to come at him.

The two of them facing each other like they had on the helicarrier... it felt like such a long time ago. So much had changed since then, it was hard for him to even fathom. Even if there were some habits he was certain he'd never get rid of, he couldn't think the way he used to. Time passed regularly now. He had allies and friends instead of owners and teams. He had a name.

Just because he and Steve were close now didn't mean he was planning on holding back, however.

Once he was certain that Bucky was ready, Steve started to dash towards him. He quickly raised his fist, aiming for a quick jab at Bucky's face. He was expecting his friend to not hold back at all and it actually made him excited. Bucky wasn't going to go easy on him, they were fighting on equal terms.

He always wanted to spar with Bucky like this. A friendly training session with his best friend.

Bucky's left arm came up to block the blow, his right fist moving to strike Steve's face in retaliation. Where the captain was nimble, the soldier was more solid and stood his ground. It certainly made for an interesting fight, he thought. He was interested in seeing where Steve planned to go with his attacks.

He wasn't surprised at all when Bucky blocked his attack. So, he was ready for the counterattack and thus managed to evade the blow. While managing to keep his pace up, he tried to swing his leg at Bucky, aiming for his friend's chest.

Steve's leg caught him in the middle, but the blow was only enough to make him stumble back a single step, his stance wider to lower his center of gravity and keep him grounded. He aimed a blow with his metal arm towards the man's chest, holding his right in front of him for defense.

He wasn't able to dodge this time, the fist directly hitting him in the chest. A small grunt of pain left him, but he didn't stop moving. Steve feigned an attack towards his face before suddenly dropping down to try and swoop Bucky's legs from underneath him.

With his weight shifted to dodge the feint, one of his legs buckled easily under the attack, but instead of dropping, he shot his left arm forward to hook around the back of Steve's neck and twisted, intending to bring the younger super soldier down with himself on top.

Steve landed on the mat hard, momentarily winded when Bucky's weight on top of him as well. He quickly recovered, however, and tried to roll them around in order to get some leverage over him.

Instead of resisting, the soldier added to and used the momentum to get away from Steve and start getting to his feet instead. They'd hardly begun--if they were going to spar seriously, he wanted to experience a longer fight before one of them surrendered, and being on the ground didn't afford a lot of mobility.

That was enough of a warm up. He'd be more aggressive from here on.

Once they were separated, Steve jumped to his feet and focused on his friend. He didn't try charging him this time, waiting to see what Bucky was going to do instead. His guard was up and ready to hopefully counter whatever his friend might pull.

Where his expression was focused before, it became intense at the moment he charged. He rushed forward three paces and transferred that momentum into an initial punch towards Steve's face, followed by two quick jabs. He'd need to wear the captain down for a while.

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