Chapter Text
As it turned out, he only got through the breaking things part of the plan before Barnes found him again. He hadn’t gotten as drunk as he would have liked, since FRIDAY had protocols to stop him from using the suit if he was intoxicated enough to be unsafe, but the alcohol had dulled the spin of memories, evidence and connections enough that mindless violence could block them out. The screaming had been pretty cathartic too.
When bare feet entered his field of vision, Tony’s first thought was that maybe he shouldn’t have brought all the old servers and monitors down to the gym to trash after all. “If you recreate the bathroom scene from Die Hard, I’m not looking.”
Jean clad legs entered the picture next, followed by a t shirt and then his favorite murder-cicle was squatting beside him. “Shiess dem Fenster,” he said with a totally straight face.
“Shoulda figured you for a Bruce Willis fan… It is not Sunday. Or even tomorrow. Is it tomorrow?” For a moment he thought he might have broken Barnes’s brain, but the other man quickly brushed past the question to answer one he hadn’t been planning on asking.
“I didn’t know.” He made a half pained half confused face then corrected himself. “I guess more I didn’t know I knew? I didn’t know that what I knew was really knowing?”
“Barnes, I haven’t taken philosophy since freshman year, and I remember just enough to know that I need to be very high for the conversation to continue along this track.” He retracted the gauntlets to gesture more effectively.
“Sorry.” The super soldier settled more to sit beside him and stared down at his own hand tracing patterns on his jeans. “They were starting the… programming on me at the same time as they installed the arm, and I think adding to the serum too. And they didn't use any kind of anesthetic unless they needed me to be completely still.”
Tony found himself rubbing over the chestplate of the suit. “Right, that’s always a good time.”
“So what I mean is, yeah, I remember Howard being there with the arm, but, ya know, I also remember Stevie’s mom holding his tools and the two of them leaving in a flying car, so…”
He couldn't help the snort of laughter that escaped. “Not even a credible source with yourself, huh?”
“Never even occurred to me to say anything about seeing him there, because I saw lots of stuff that I knew couldn’t be real.”
“We don’t know if there’s life after death, but we do know that people hallucinate.” At the blank look he elaborated, “Carl Sagan, great popularizer of science and skeptical thought. I get it, slot machine, I’m not angry at you for not telling us about everyone you thought you saw while ridiculously mentally compromised.”
“You’re angry though.”
“What gave you the first clue,” he gestured to the scorched walls and destroyed equipment. “I'm on this fucking roller coaster is what I am, and I want to just know.” He stared up at one of the cameras in the ceiling, pretending he was talking to JARVIS. “It was called a single car accident, not bad enough road conditions to be anything but driver error. So I blamed Howard for Mom’s death for decades, with occasional bouts of blaming myself - for not going with them, for fighting with him beforehand, for not knowing somehow and getting her to stay home…”
“Then I saw that tape and I could blame you, or Hydra once I had a moment to think, and that was easier. But now I’m back to the mess. Was he still Hydra? Was he double dealing them and dragging my mom into danger with him? Or was it some internal power play? Was he not with them anymore, working for SHIELD for real and we’re back to just blaming Hydra? I need to know.”
“So that’s the hacking part of the plan?”
“And going over the old mansion with a fine tooth comb. Then, more drinking.” He started climbing to his feet and folded the gauntlets back down to sweep aside debris with the lowest repulsor setting. “Come on, Roy Rogers, let’s get you out of here before the other Rogers can blame me for a splinter in your toe.”
“Yippee yi oh ki yay.”
“You said it, motherfucker.”