Archive of Our Own

“Cybertek built Deathlok,
shipped items to Quinn,
who was working for the Clairvoyant,
who turned out to be Garrett,
who planted Ward on our bus
because he wanted to know
why I didn’t stay dead.”

—Phil Coulson, Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D. episode 1.21 Ragtag

PART ONE

The Soldier’s first order comes when he opens his eyes. He’s in the chair—plastic coats his teeth and metal pinches his temples—it's nothing that the Soldier hasn’t felt before. He remembers the sensation in his muscles, though he cannot recall the last time he was here.

Handlers in crisp white lab coats hover at the edges of the room, holding pens to clipboards and gazing nervously at him. The Soldier squints as text appears directly in his eye-line, as if from a teleprompter:

KILL CAPTAIN AMERICA AND HIS ASSOCIATES.

The Soldier grits his teeth against the plastic mouthguard, tries to shake his head out of the pincers and his wrists out of the shackles. A couple of lab coats approach, tentatively lifting the Soldier’s restraints.

As soon as he’s free, the Soldier stands.

KILL CAPTAIN AMERICA AND HIS ASSOCIATES.

The text moves as his eyes do, always in the center of his vision.

The Soldier pushes past lab coats and exits the room—as he does, an agent in a stealth suit hands him a rifle and a blade. The Soldier straps the rifle to his back and the knife to his holster, then barges out of the facility and onto the streets of D.C.

The Soldier marches onto a highway. He walks until he sees a black car with four people inside—CODENAME: CAPTAIN AMERICA, CODENAME: FALCON, CODENAME: BLACK WIDOW, and Hydra's AGENT SITWELL. The Soldier relishes in throwing the compromised Hydra agent out of the car and hearing his last scream.

The Soldier jumps onto the roof of the car and shoots inside, but Captain America is fast. He and his associates escape.

The Soldier follows them slowly down the highway and onto the street below.

There is no rush. He always kills his targets in the end.

The fight is going smoothly, as expected, until the Soldier’s mask falls off. He turns to face Captain America and scowls.

“Bucky?”

“Who the hell is Bucky?”

A flash of text:

DO NOT LISTEN.

The Soldier’s hearing shuts off—the pops and hums of gunfire disappear, replaced by a single whine. The Soldier focuses on the blond threat before him. He fights. He follows orders. He does not complete his mission.

“The man on the bridge,” the Soldier says later, his glassy eyes looking past his handler. “Who was he?”

“You met him on a mission,” his handler says. “You will meet him again. In the meantime, I have a new target for you.” He holds up a picture of a balding white man with a long nose and warm green eyes. “Phil Coulson,” his handler says. “Agent of SHIELD.”

“The program is called Project Deathlok,” Hill explains, tossing a file on the grimy table. Steve and three others sit around her: Natasha, Sam, and Fury. Other agents line the edges of the room. As far as Steve can tell, they’re in a cave.

Steve leans towards the file, but Natasha has already opened it—inside are photos of a man with third-degree burns on his warm brown skin, and a cybernetic eye.

“You’re saying Bucky has similar… enhancements?” Steve asks, grimacing.

“I’m saying it’s likely,” Hill replies. “If the Winter Soldier has a Deathlok eye, then Hydra sees what he sees.”

“It also means he has a kill switch in his brain,” Natasha says.

Steve looks to her for comfort, but Natasha is peering at Sam. His arms are crossed and his eyes are narrowed at Hill. “I wouldn’t mind having access to that switch,” Sam says.

“Absolutely not.” Steve stands, then jabs the file with his index finger. “If we do anything with this information, it’ll be to save him. Understood?”

Fury leans back in his chair. “Looks like you’re giving the orders now, Cap,” he says.

Steve wraps his knuckles on the file. “If we can disengage Bucky’s kill switch, maybe we can reverse his amnesia as well.”

“Extraction requires surgery,” Hill says. “We’d need him in our custody, preferably sedated, and preferably without Hydra knowing. Then we’d have to hack the camera in his eye and send an agent into the field with it, pretending to be him until we can remove the kill switch.”

“How?” Steve asks.

“A hacker, to start,” Hill says. “Romanoff?”

“On it,” Natasha says. She points to an agent in the corner of the room and says, “You. Laptop. Now.”

“Yes ma’am,” the agent says. He returns shortly, placing a clunky old Dell in front of Natasha. She frowns but opens it, clicking her nails on the keyboard. Steve watches, his heart pounding with anticipation.

“I’m in,” Natasha says after a moment, smirking at the screen. “Give me twenty.”

The Soldier approaches the Triskelion and makes his way to the central landing strip. His handlers’ latest message reads:

PREVENT CAPTAIN AMERICA AND HIS ASSOCIATES FROM REACHING SHIELD HELICARRIERS.

The text hovers over kevlar suits as they run toward the Soldier. The Soldier aims his rifle at their necks, killing each agent easily before walking to the helicarriers.

Falcon flies into one of them, holding Captain America to his chest and dropping him off. He flies to the second, and the Soldier hurries after him.

Falcon flies out of the second helicarrier and kicks the Soldier in the chest. The Soldier rips off one of his wings and sends him flying, but not before overhearing Falcon say into his comms, “Two is down.”

The Soldier runs to the third helicarrier, jumping in as it reaches the air. He spots Captain America above him, heading to the control center in the middle of the ship.

The Soldier is cocking his rifle and aiming at Captain America when the text in front of him disappears. A new order rolls into the Soldier’s line of sight—HI JAMES :), it says. The name sparks something in the Soldier’s mind, an echo of familiarity, and then more text appears:

HI JAMES :) DESTROY THE HELICARRIERS WITHOUT COLLATERAL. RETURN CAPTAIN AMERICA TO THE TRISKELION ALIVE.

Captain America shoves a device into the control center, and the helicarrier begins to whir. The Soldier runs forward and tackles Captain America, wrapping his arms around the Captain’s chest—“Hey!” he says, struggling against the Soldier’s grip.

The Soldier grips him tighter, pushing them forward. “You’re my mission,” he tells Captain America.

The Captain wriggles out of the Soldier’s grip and punches him in the face. The Soldier staggers back, holding out his metal arm, fingers grasping at Captain America’s vibrant uniform.

“You’re my mission,” he says again, weakly. He lurches forward.

The Captain steps back, then places a finger in his ear. “What?” he says. He turns to the Soldier. “Mission report,” he says.

“Mission ongoing,” the Soldier replies. “Target uncooperative.”

“You should be used to that,” Captain America says warmly. Is he—teasing? He grows serious as he says, “What are your orders? Tell me verbatim.”

The Soldier recites, “‘Hi James. Colon, closed parenthesis. Destroy the helicarriers without collateral. Return Captain America to the Triskelion alive.’”

“Good work, Nat,” Captain America says under his breath. He drops his arms and smiles.

The Soldier feels a twist in his gut, and his heart rate elevates. He wonders if the Captain has poisoned him.

Regardless, the Soldier has orders. He grabs Captain America’s arm and surges forward, the helicarriers in flames around them. The Soldier looks over the edge and sees two options—a water landing and a concrete one.

He pushes Captain America into the Potomac, then jumps after him.

The Soldier crashes into the river and opens his eyes. The Captain’s are closed, and he’s sinking—the Soldier hooks his arms under Captain America’s armpits and pulls him up, then swims to the riverbank with him in tow.

Captain America is unconscious when the Soldier drags him onto land. His red lips are parted, and a bruise is growing on his forehead. The Soldier looks at him for a moment, then at the text on his chest:

HI JAMES :) DESTROY THE HELICARRIERS WITHOUT COLLATERAL. RETURN CAPTAIN AMERICA TO THE TRISKELION ALIVE.

Step one is complete. The Soldier kneels beside the Captain and throws his unconscious body over the Soldier's shoulder. He walks away from the river and towards the Triskelion as smoke and embers sting the air around him.

Steve opens his eyes in the hospital. Marvin Gaye plays softly on the radio, and Sam is in a chair beside him, reading a magazine. “On your left,” Steve says, and Sam glows, tossing aside the magazine and reaching for Steve’s hand.

“How are you?” Sam asks in his Dad Voice.

“M’fine,” Steve grumbles. “Where’s—how’s Bucky?”

“He’s in surgery,” Sam says. His eyes dart from bruise to bruise on Steve's sore body. “Fury’s got a team removing the Cyber-Tech now.”

“Thank God,” Steve says. He struggles to sit up, and feels Sam’s hand gently push him down.

“I promise to tell you when he’s out,” Sam says. “In the meantime, I’ve got strict orders to keep your ass in bed.”

Steve leans back on his pillow and smiles. It’s softer than he’s used to. “Well, I wouldn’t wanna get you in trouble,” he says.

“Yeah, you already owe me,” Sam says, grinning. “And you especially don’t wanna make trouble with Nat.”

“They’re her orders?”

Sam nods.

“She gives you orders?”

Sam shrugs. “I’m not about to tell her no.”

Steve sighs. “I want to see Bucky.”

“I know you do,” Sam says. He squeezes Steve’s hand. “As soon as he’s ready, you will.”

Bucky’s first order arrives when he opens his eyes. “Behave,” says a smooth female voice, “or I will personally see to it that you never see Rogers again.”

“Steve’s here?” Bucky asks. He tries to bring his fingers to his eyes, but his right wrist is handcuffed to the hospital bed. He tries to lift his metal fingers, but finds that he can't.

“We disconnected the prosthetic from your nervous system,” the woman says. “It's dead weight until we turn it back on.”

“Who are you?” Bucky asks. “Where’s Steve?” The woman narrows her eyes. “Is he okay?”

“Steve is fine,” she says. “What is your name?”

“My name is Bucky.”

“Your full name?”

“I don’t know.”

“Where are you from?”

“I don’t know.”

“Who do you work for?”

“I worked for Hydra,” Bucky says. “I didn’t want to.”

“Who is Steve Rogers?”

“Steve Rogers is Captain America,” Bucky says. He knows this to be true, though he doesn’t remember his own last name. He doesn’t remember his parents, or his hometown, or where he lives now. But he remembers blue eyes and a crooked nose—recalls a skinny blond holding a trashcan lid like a shield, then a broad-shouldered beefcake holding a real one. He recalls Captain America giving a salute—saluting him?—then leaping in the air with an explosion at his six and decapitating a Nazi with his shield.

“Who is Steve Rogers?” the woman repeats.

Bucky feels a warm glow in his chest. “Steve is my friend,” he says. After a beat, he adds, “His mom’s name was Sarah.”

The woman pulls a device from her pocket. She taps something into it and nods.

“My name is Natasha,” she says, putting the device back in her pocket. “If you have any questions, ask one of the nurses for me.”

Bucky nods. His eyes follow her out of his room, then he watches the door shut behind her.

Memories swirl through Bucky’s mind like a tornado. His nose feels the sting of cold air as his handlers shove him into cryostasis, then smells the rich scent of Alexander Pierce’s cologne. He hears orders barked in Russian and honeyed reassurances in English, sees bombs go off in American forts and closes his eyes against the rush of heat and dirt. Fragments slot together out of order, and Bucky feels jumbled. His only solid memory is of his hands on Captain America’s, blood mingling with dirt, the familiar give of his waist. Bucky knows that he knows him—but he doesn’t have the answers Bucky needs.

Bucky squeezes his eyes shut and remembers the last face he saw before the Triskelion—white skin, long nose, green eyes—the Soldier had captured the man, but where had he taken him? He can’t remember.

The fluorescent lightbulb flickers, and Bucky opens his eyes. He pulls a plastic tray from his bedside and places it between his teeth. Then he steadies his breathing and cracks the lowest bone in his pinky.

Pain shoots through Bucky’s hand as he hears the bone break, but he slips it out of its handcuff easily. Then he disconnects the metal arm from his shoulder and sits up, pushing his pinky against his thigh to reset it.

Bucky gets to his feet, wobbling slightly, and glances around the room. He sees two guards outside his door—if he was armed, he could easily take them, but in his current state he isn’t sure. Instead, Bucky heads to the window and looks down. He’s only on the second floor.

He rips open the window and pulls off the screen. Then he climbs awkwardly over the sill and jumps down, landing clumsily on the ground. He turns to the hospital, giving one last sweeping glance at the building that he knows houses Steve. Then Bucky creeps through the bushes and disappears, off to find the green-eyed man and why Hydra had wanted him alive.

On Steve’s second day in the hospital, Natasha comes to visit. She sits in Sam’s recently abandoned chair and says, “Steve.”

“Natasha.”

“I have some bad news.”

“I can take it.”

Natasha raises an eyebrow. “Barnes is gone.”

Steve sits up at once, gripping the sides of his bed. His fingers leave dents in it.

Natasha places a hand over his. “We rerouted the tracker in his eye,” she says. “Call it insurance. He won’t get far.”

“You left Cybertek’s weapons inside of him?” Steve asks, curling his free hand into a fist.

“Relax, He-Man,” Natasha says. “The kill switch is gone, and Cybertek can’t access the tracker anymore.”

“You can't know that,” Steve says. “They could be out there looking for him. They could’ve already found him.”

“He’s in a museum,” Natasha replies. “Alone.” She takes her hand from Steve’s and pulls her phone out of her pocket, then shows him a map of D.C. A red dot blinks in the Smithsonian.

“That’s Bucky?” Steve asks.

Natasha nods. She clicks off her phone and puts it away. “If any hostiles appear within five miles of his location, we’ll get an alert.”

“I need to find him,” Steve says. He pushes himself out of bed, but Natasha gently pushes him back down.

“Rest,” she says. “I’ll keep an eye on him.”

Steve frowns.

“You still don’t trust me?”

Steve shrugs. “Not with him.”

Natasha narrows her eyes. “You can leave as soon as you’re cleared,” she says. Then she takes her phone out of her pocket and rests it on Steve’s thigh.

Steve stares at the tracker while Natasha shuffles through Sam’s stack of magazines. She pulls out a copy of People and flips it open.

While Natasha skims the gossip rag, Steve watches the Bucky-dot blink steadily. It spends an hour inside the Smithsonian, then heads for the mall. It stays there for a long time.

Bucky sits on the grass in the Washington Mall with his head in his hand, baseball cap pulled low over his eyes. He still can’t remember the name of the green-eyed man, where he is, or what Hydra wants with him. Instead, Bucky went to the Smithsonian and remembered some parts of himself.

His full name is James Buchanan Barnes. He had a ma and a pa and four sisters and was born in 1917. He’d followed his best friend Steve into war—that much Bucky had already known, deep in his gut like an instinct—and then Bucky had died for him. That detail was new.

Now, Bucky sits with his head in his hand, feeling dizzy. He didn’t find a picture of the green-eyed man anywhere in the exhibit, nor in the rest of the museum. Still, he knows that the man is the key to something—that he’ll put all the pieces together. What Bucky doesn’t know is what those pieces are or where they lead. He doesn’t know which one he is.

The green-eyed man won’t be happy to see him, either, not after the Soldier kidnapped him and threw him in—a cell? Probably. There was always a cell.

Bucky scans through his rolodex of memories, old and new, but doesn’t find anything useful. It’s mostly filled with images of Steve.

There is another name that Bucky remembers, one he sees on the walls of his exhibit and seemingly everywhere else—Stark. It rests below a photo of Howard, technological and engineering consultant for the SSR, integral to the creation of Project Rebirth; it shines on scaffolding and blinks on mobile phones, infecting this time like a virus. Bucky knows that name, knows Howard’s face—he thinks he may have known him, and/or killed him—so he follows it back to New York, to a glittering tower in Midtown. It only has an A on it now, but Bucky sees its neighboring ghosts—hints of ST and RK on either side.

This building has answers—Bucky knows it. So he pulls his cap over his eyes and walks inside.

“Tony has Barnes in custody,” Natasha says. She and Steve are at his apartment in D.C., sitting on his broken couch and staring at the glass and blood on his floor. “For an internationally renowned assassin, he isn’t great at staying under the radar.”

Steve's whole body sighs in relief, exhaling the fear that’s been rolling through him since Bucky had disappeared from medical. “Does Tony know what Bucky was looking for?”

“Said he was muttering about a green-eyed man,” Natasha says. She leans forward and looks in Steve’s eyes.

Steve widens them.

“Nope,” Natasha says. “Blue.” She shakes her head. “Could the Winter Soldier be a secret Channing Tatum fan?”

“Your guess is as good as mine,” Steve says. He gets up from the couch and puts his keys in his pocket. “You comin’ with me?”

Natasha nods.

“Then let’s go,” Steve says. He heads for the door.

“We taking the bike?” Natasha asks, following him out of his building.

“Can if you want,” Steve says. He walks up to his motorcycle and runs his hands over the handlebars.

Natasha takes a helmet from the back of the bike and pulls it over her head. She hands the other one to Steve.

Steve accepts the helmet and puts it on, then swings his legs over the bike. Natasha echoes his movement and clutches his waist.

“What are we waiting for?” she asks.

Steve rolls his eyes and kicks the motorcycle into gear.

A familiar tune hums from the ceiling of Bucky’s containment unit. He sits on the bench inside, hands clasped, eyeing the man on the other side of the glass.

“Recognize the song?” his captor asks, waving a finger to the beat. “It’s Barnacle Bill the Sailor. In honor of my noble capture of Bucky Barnacles.”

The captor is a relative of Howard Stark’s. They have the same dark hair and simple nose, the same flicker of madness in their eyes. This Stark has more energy, like he’s been plied with methamphetamines and set loose to dismantle Bucky’s sanity.

The captor puts a finger in his ear and frowns. “Code is 0-4-1-0. See you soon.” Then he turns to Bucky and says, “You’re in luck, Regice. Cap’s on his way to bail you out.”

Bucky feels a flutter of recognition in his chest. He maintains a neutral expression, but when his captor turns his head, Bucky lets a thin smile pull at the edges of his lips.

When Steve arrives, he puts his hand on the glass of Bucky’s containment unit, staring at him wistfully. Bucky looks in his eyes but keeps his expression unchanged.

“I hear you’re looking for a green-eyed man,” Steve says. He curls his fingers against the glass. “Can I help?”

Bucky flicks his eyes over to Stark.

“Tony,” Steve says. “Can you give us the room?”

“You want privacy? After your cyborg infiltrated my tower?” Stark crosses his arms. “Fine. I trust you. But not him.” Stark points at Bucky. “I’ll watch the feed from outside.” With that, Stark leaves the room, eyes narrowed at Bucky as he goes.

Bucky feels himself relax.

“What can you tell me about the man you’re looking for?” Steve asks gently.

The green-eyed man’s face flashes through Bucky’s mind. “I took him,” Bucky says. “I don’t know where.”

“That’s okay,” Steve says. “We found a number of Hydra facilities when Natasha dumped their secrets online. She’s searching for him now.”

Bucky frowns. “Cybertek,” he says.

Steve’s face goes cold. “What?”

“I don’t know what it is,” Bucky shrugs, “but I think it’s important.”

Steve pulls a mobile phone from his pocket and shoots off a text. A moment later, Bucky hears a ding. “How would you feel about working with a sketch artist to get a picture of the green-eyed man?”

Bucky shakes his head.

“What if the sketch artist was me?”

Bucky runs through pros and cons lightning-fast. On the one hand, Bucky trusts Steve innately, as if their instincts for self-preservation are entwined. On the other, Bucky knows that the green-eyed man has ugly secrets—otherwise, why would Hydra want him?—and Bucky feels hesitant to get Steve involved.

But his eyes are so warm, and so desperate to help. So Bucky nods.

Steve grins a mile wide and says, “JARVIS? A sketchpad and some pencils to Interrogation Room C, please.”

Halfway through the sketch, Steve recognizes the man on his page.

Agent Phil Coulson, K.I.A. before the Battle of New York. Steve can still see Coulson’s blood-stained trading cards, the trail of red they left on Fury's pristine glass table. Coulson's death was two years ago now, and Steve’s wound from it has scarred. He hasn’t thought about Coulson in months.

Steve surreptitiously snaps a photo of his sketch and sends it to Hill and Natasha with ? as the caption. Hill texts back immediately: Shut it down.

Steve raises an eyebrow. “Bucky,” he says, looking through the containment unit’s glass. “Are you sure that you took this man recently? Not a couple years ago?”

“I’m sure,” Bucky says. “He was my last mission before you.”

Natasha texts back a moment later: If Coulson is alive, May would know.

Steve searches his mind for the name and returns with a stoic Chinese woman in SHIELD’s administration department. He thinks she and Coulson were close. Steve texts Natasha: Can you make contact?

Already on it.

Steve smiles and puts the phone in his pocket. “We’re gonna get you answers, Buck,” he says. “I promise.”

—Grant Ward, Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D. episode 3.09 Closure

PART TWO

It’s unusually difficult for Natasha to track down Agent Melinda May, and she knows that she has Hill to thank for that. Maria has been testy ever since she interviewed for Stark Industries, still not accepting that her Level 9 security clearance was gone. Natasha figures that if Hill wants to keep Coulson’s secret as a last ditch attempt to be the SHIELD agent she was, Natasha should let her.

Eventually she finds May in the air, on the Airborne Mobile Command Station known as SHIELD 616. Natasha easily steals a quinjet from Senator Stern’s private fleet and disables its tracker, ripping wires with her teeth and turning on an old-school, untraceable radar.

Rather than board May’s bus with the quinjet, Natasha flies it above the bus’s line of sight and opens the on-ramp, dropping onto SHIELD 616 with a parachute and slipping inside.

Natasha makes her way through the bus, dodging agents and scientists and until she finds the room she’s looking for. She peers through the keyhole and spots May, thankfully alone, eyes narrowed at a paper in her hand. Natasha silently picks the lock and steps inside.

May looks up from her desk, eyebrows shooting into the air when she sees Nat.

Natasha locks the door behind her. “May,” she says.

“Romanoff,” May replies, putting the paper on her desk. “What are you doing here?”

“Coulson,” Natasha says. “He’s alive.”

May's expression remains blank.

“Is he on the bus?” Natasha moves further into the room, eyeing old gadgets and collectibles. She spots a framed copy of a 1960s Sergeant Barnes trading card atop a bookshelf and says, “This is his office.”

“Coulson isn’t here,” May says. She stands up from the desk and walks over to Natasha, eyeing her fellow agent’s face. “What do you want?”

“Answers.”

“Maybe I have them.”

“Maybe you do,” Natasha says, “but my orders are for him.”

“Orders,” May mutters. “From Hill?”

Natasha smirks.

“But Fury is dead," May deadpans.

Natasha raises an eyebrow.

May studies her. 

"Understood," Natasha says. "Does Coulson know?"

May gives her one last searching look before she slowly nods her head.

"And the rest of the bus?"

"Just me," May says. Her eyes don't leave Natasha's.

Natasha notes that May isn't carrying a weapon. She feels a tug of connection, and wonders—not for the first time—if her time at SHIELD would've been better with a team.

Then May says, "Tell me why you're really here," and Natasha remembers.

She quickly weighs her options. “Project Deathlok,” Nat says. She sees May’s fingers twitch, nearly imperceptibly, and knows she’s hit her mark. “What does Cybertek want with Phil Coulson?”

May pauses a moment, then says, "Loki's scepter. You saw the damage. He shouldn’t have lived.”

“Lot of that going around these days,” Nat drawls. She cocks her head, taking in Agent May: the volume of her hair, her short stature, her sharp gaze. Natasha has always liked her, as much as Natasha likes anyone at SHIELD. Briefly, she wonders if Steve could ask her out.

Another look at May's death stare shakes that image from Nat's mind. “The Winter Soldier,” she says. She watches May’s face carefully and adds, “He’s real. And he’s with Cybertek.”

May deepens her frown. “The Winter Soldier is a part of Project Deathlok?” she whispers.

In lieu of a response, Natasha takes a pen and paper from Coulson’s desk and writes down the line to her comms. “Have Coulson call me,” she says.

“You don’t have clearance,” May replies.

“Then grant it to me,” Natasha snaps, and leaves the room.

Steve’s D.C. apartment shows no sign of the man that lives within. Bucky sees paintings that aren’t Steve’s taste—he’s always been more Harlem than Italian Renaissance—and cubic furniture in neutral tones.

The place could’ve been furnished by a robot, but not by Steve Rogers.

“Why do you live here?” Bucky asks. He lets his eyes drop from a bookcase full of political biographies—where are the comics?—and a framed photo of Captain America shaking President Ellis’s hand. Bucky snorts when his eyes fall on that one.

Steve follows his gaze and smiles sheepishly. “I can jog to the Triskelion,” he says. “I’m close to Peggy.”

“Peggy.” The name stains Bucky’s memory red—he flinches, but it isn’t blood. It’s lipstick.

“Agent Carter,” Bucky says.

Steve’s face lights up. “You remember her?”

“I—I’m sorry.” The lipstick is the only detail he can see.

Steve’s face falls, but he tries to conceal it with a smile. “It’s okay, Buck,” he says. “These things take time.”

“We don’t have time,” Bucky says, shaking his head. There’s something he isn’t remembering—something about the green-eyed man and Hydra.

Steve reaches for Bucky, but Bucky pulls away from the touch. Steve is hurt, Bucky can sense it, but he can’t be touched right now. His body is a beehive, buzzing and shaking, dangerous to poke.

“The green-eyed man,” Bucky says. He clutches his chest, doubles over. The buzzing is the feeling of a blade against his stomach, slicing him from hip to hip. “The green—the green-eyed—”

“We know who he is now, Bucky,” Steve says. “It’s gonna be okay.”

“His name,” Bucky gasps. “What’s his name?”

“Phil Coulson,” Steve says, and Bucky remembers.

The Soldier’s first order arrives when he opens his eyes. He’s in the chair—plastic coats his teeth and metal pinches his temples—it's nothing that the Soldier hasn’t felt before. He remembers the sensation in his muscles, though he cannot recall the last time he was here.

Handlers in crisp white lab coats hover at the edges of the room, holding pens to clipboards and gazing nervously at him. The Soldier squints as text appears directly in his eye-line, as if from a teleprompter:

CAPTURE AGENT PHIL COULSON AND BRING HIM TO BASE 33.

The Soldier sits up. “The man on the bridge,” he says, his glassy eyes looking through the text on his handler’s chest. “Who was he?”

“You met him on a mission,” his handler says. “You will meet him again. In the meantime, I have a new target for you.” He holds up a picture of a balding white man with a long nose and warm green eyes. “Phil Coulson,” his handler says. “Agent of SHIELD.”

The Soldier finds Coulson with his hands up and his gun at his feet, a lazy smile lighting up his face. “I knew you were real,” he says. “I take it the mission is capture, not kill?”

The Soldier responds with a tranq to Coulson’s chest.

Coulson falls, and the Soldier catches him. He slings the limp man over his shoulder and begins the trek to Base 33.

The base is cold and gray, just like every other one the Soldier’s seen. This one, though, sparks a modicum of memory—the Soldier walks past a room with a great metal chair and his head hurts, a low metallic whine. He staggers, nearly dropping Coulson from his shoulder, but quickly re-rights himself.

He walks to an interrogation room—he’s never been to this part of the base before, but he sees the path like Ariadne’s string, a faint glow of knowledge on the floor. He dumps Agent Coulson in a small metal chair and the text in front of his eyes disappears. The new text reads:

RETURN TO CRYOSTASIS.

The Soldier complies.

When Steve says Coulson’s name, Bucky’s face drains of color. He falls onto his hands and knees, clutching the gray carpet. Steve bends down and hovers near him, careful not to overwhelm his senses. It’s hard not to touch him, to reach for him, but Steve curls his hands into fists and keeps them at his side. Bucky gasps and looks up, right at Steve, and Steve can’t help but lean into him.

Bucky grabs Steve’s hand and looks into his eyes, terrified. “I know where Coulson is,” he says. “I know what Hydra wants with him.”

There’s a knock at the door.

Steve’s eyes dart toward the sound. He presses a finger to his lips and Bucky nods. Then Steve lifts his shield and creeps to the door. Bucky follows, aiming a rifle past Steve’s shoulder. Steve turns to him and nods. Bucky nods back.

Steve opens the door.

“Hello,” Phil Coulson says. He waves. “Can I come in?”

Bucky sits stiffly on Steve’s gray couch while Steve putters around the kitchen, gathering a glass of water and a plate of snacks for his unexpected guest. Bucky half-expects a plate of pomegranate seeds, but Steve sets a bowl of grapes on the coffee table instead.

“Sorry,” Steve says, staring at the sad display. He sets a glass of water on a coaster next to the bowl, and Coulson smiles politely from his armchair.

“This is great, thanks,” Coulson says, reaching for the water.

Steve sits next to Bucky on the couch.

“You’re down an arm,” Coulson says, nodding at Bucky’s left side. “We can fix that.”

Bucky shakes his head.

“Alright.” Coulson’s attitude has been nothing but jovial since he appeared at Steve’s door. Bucky has never seen a person—other than Steve—so happy to be near him.

Coulson pops a grape in his mouth and grimaces. “Couldn’t swing for seedless?”

Steve smiles apologetically. “Not used to seedless,” he says.

Coulson takes a long drink of water, then looks at Bucky. Bucky maintains eye contact, but Coulson doesn’t seem scared. He doesn’t seem flustered. He seems normal, as if he meets formerly dead Soviet assassins every day.

Maybe he does. Bucky doesn’t know Coulson’s life.

All he knows is what came after it.

“You didn’t come here for grapes,” Bucky says.

Coulson’s lazy smiles expands. “No,” he says. “I came here for you.”

Steve throws a protective arm in front of Bucky’s chest. Bucky places it back in Steve’s lap and looks to him with pleading eyes. “Can you give us the room, Stevie?”

Steve visibly melts at the nickname. “Sure,” he says softly. He reaches for Bucky’s shoulder, then pulls back. “I’ll be in my room.”

When Bucky and Coulson are alone, Coulson clasps his hands in his lap and looks at Bucky appraisingly. “You want answers,” he says. “I have them.”

“TAHITI?” Bucky asks.

"It's a magical place."

“Take me to it,” Bucky says.

Coulson’s lazy smile turns into something mischievous. He sweeps his hand towards Steve’s front door. “After you, Sergeant,” he grins.

When Steve emerges from his bedroom, both Bucky and Coulson are gone. He shoots a quick text to Natasha: Where’d they go? After a moment, he adds: Where are you?

Meet me at the Starbucks on 18th NW. Be covert.

Steve looks around for his baseball cap and sighs.

Twenty minutes later, Steve has a Dodgers cap pulled over his eyes and a pair of Gucci sunglasses on that Natasha had left at his apartment. He steps into the Starbucks and looks around, then spots Natasha at a table in the center of the room, a half-sipped iced latte beside her open laptop. Her straight red hair is in two braids and she has a black beanie hanging loosely over her forehead, a matching hoodie zipped up to her neck. Steve stares at the floor as he sits in the chair across from hers.

“About time,” Natasha says. She swivels her laptop around to face Steve. There are schematics on the screen—Steve recognizes the blueprints for Bucky’s eye, PROJECT DEATHLOK, and sees plans for another machine, PROJECT T.A.H.I.T.I.

“What’s that?” Steve asks, gesturing to the screen.

Natasha swivels the laptop back to herself and says, “This is why Hydra captured Coulson. This is what Barnes wants to find.”

“A machine to recover his memories.” Steve pushes his cap up and wipes a line of sweat from his forehead. “Where is it?”

“With SHIELD,” Natasha says. “At least, it was.”

“When there was a SHIELD,” Steve says. “So Coulson has it?”

“I assume so, if Barnes left with him willingly,” Natasha says. She leans back in her chair and lifts her iced latte, biting the straw.

“Can you find them?” Steve asks.

“I could,” Natasha says. She squints at Steve. “Do you want me to?”

“Why wouldn’t I?”

“Barnes left without you for a reason,” Natasha says. “Maybe you should trust it.”

“It’s not him I don’t trust.”

“You don't trust Coulson?”

“I don’t trust Hydra,” Steve snaps. “I don’t trust that they’re not still inside him.”

“The kill switch is gone, Steve,” Natasha says. She places her latte on the table and wipes her fingers on her jeans.

“He needs me,” Steve says.

Natasha’s lip quirks up. “You underestimate Coulson.”

“The last time I saw him, he died.”

“He died to save us,” Natasha says. “He’d do the same for Barnes.”

“You don’t know that.” Steve searches Natasha’s face, but her expression is, as always, inscrutable. “Please,” he says.

Natasha studies him. “We don’t interfere unless we need to,” she says.

“I’ll follow your orders,” Steve says. “Just take me to him.”

Natasha closes her laptop with a soft click. “Alright,” she says. “But we’re taking the bike.”

“Yes ma’am,” Steve says. He takes Natasha’s hand. “Thank you.”

Natasha squeezes his back. “You’re welcome.”

Coulson takes Bucky to a quinjet, then to the sky. Bucky sits in the co-pilot’s seat stiffly, following Coulson’s few orders and staring directly ahead. They touch down on an Airborne Mobile Command Station, which Coulson affectionately refers to as ‘the bus.’ Once inside, Coulson is greeted by an onslaught of hugs from three agents in their twenties. A few other agents stand by.

One of the agents, a short Chinese woman with the meanest face Bucky's ever seen, looks Bucky up and down. “Looks like Romanoff told the truth," she says.

“And thank goodness she did,” Coulson says. “Think of all the intel Sergeant Barnes has.”

“Everything that wasn’t in the data dump,” says one of the people in their twenties. She’s clearly excitable, with smudged eyeliner and a lanyard flapping on her chest. “We could use his information to stop Hydra.”

“The problem is, he doesn’t remember it yet,” Coulson says. “But he wants to.”

The whole room turns to Bucky. His cheeks heat as he nods.

“Get to it then,” Coulson says. “Fitzsimmons, Skye—get Sergeant Barnes to the memory machine now.”

Natasha leads Steve to an Air Force hangar in Maryland, then over to one of its quinjets. “Wanna take another of Stern’s toys?” she asks, running her hand along the jet’s dark metal.

Steve looks at Natasha in mild horror. “You stole a Senator’s quinjet?”

“I owed Tony a favor,” Natasha says with a shrug. “Casualties of prank war.”

"You stole a Senator's quinjet because of a prank war with Tony?"

Natasha grins. “Well, when you put it like that.” She eyes a sleek jet, the smallest Steve can see. “That one,” she says, pointing.

Steve shakes his head as Natasha dashes to the jet and hops inside. Steve follows, settling into the co-pilot’s seat as Natasha sits beside him, flicking levers and adjusting blinking panels. Soon they’re in the air.

Steve's back is ramrod straight. “How long till we reach 616?”

"We’ll get there when we get there," Natasha says. "Relax."

“You’re gonna need to stop telling me to relax,” Steve says, digging his nails into the armrest. He pulls out his mobile phone and scrolls through the Cybertek blueprints that Natasha recovered at Starbucks. “This memory machine. It’s safe?”

Natasha stares straight ahead. “We’ll arrive at the bus within the hour,” she says.

Forty minutes later, Steve looks down and sees a ripple in the clouds. The bus appears shortly after. Natasha flips a switch on the ceiling and the on-ramp shudders open. “You got a parachute?” she asks.

“Don’t need one,” Steve says. He stands up and straps on his helmet, then walks to the on-ramp. “See you inside,” he says.

If Natasha responds, Steve doesn’t hear it. Instead, he jumps onto SHIELD 616 and drops inside.

FitzSimmons turns out to be two people: a Scottish man, Fitz, and an English woman, Simmons. They and Agent Skye lead Bucky to a white room on the lowest level of the bus with a containment unit in its center. Bucky sees a thin white table within the containment unit, a mess of wires hanging around its head.

The memory machine.

Simmons opens the containment unit and gestures for Bucky to follow her inside. He does, and she closes the door behind them. Fitz and Skye watch them through a window.

Bucky sits on the white table and runs his fingers on the edge. “How does it work?” he asks.

“All you’ll have to do is lie down,” Simmons says, with a smile that Bucky thinks is meant to reassure him. Bucky lies down with the mess of wires at his feet.

“Other way,” Fitz calls.

“Your head under here, please,” Simmons says, patting a circular bit of plastic that covers the table in a ring.

Bucky shifts until Simmons is above him. She smiles again, but with her body eclipsing the light, the effect is eerie.

Bucky closes his eyes.

“Focus on your earliest memory of Hydra,” Simmons says. “As far back as you can.”

Bucky sees a flash of blue light and hears a scream.

“Three… two… one…” Simmons says, and Bucky remembers.

He’s nine years old, battered and covered in mud. An eight-year-old Steve stands beside him, looking even worse—blood soaks his hairline and drips into his brow, threatening to fall in his blackened eye. Steve’s hands are up and he’s glaring at the mess of bullies nearby.

“Stevie, no—” Bucky says, but it’s too late. Steve lurches forward, his thin arms swinging.

Bucky sighs and joins the fray.

“Focus on my voice.” It’s Simmons, her twinkling accent coming from the sky. “Where are you, Sergeant Barnes?”

He’s at a bar on Sands Street, twenty-two and drunker than a drag queen. He wiggles his hips with his arms around some punk, the taste of stale beer on his breath. Steve is on the other side of the bar, arguing with a man about the juke. Bucky revels in the scene’s familiarity, leans his head against the punk he’s dancing with and lets the room sway back and forth.

“Let’s get outta here,” Steve says, sliding up to Bucky with a frown. “Motherfucker won’t turn off Ben Selvin.”

“What’ve you got against Selvin?” Bucky asks, but he disconnects himself from his dance partner and grins apologetically. The punk rolls his eyes and leaves, making room for Steve.

“I wanted to put on Tiger Rag,” Steve says.

Bucky chuckles and presses a sloppy kiss to Steve’s forehead. “Next time,” he says, his body warming to Steve’s side.

“This is all very sweet, but it isn’t what we’re looking for,” Simmons says. “I hate to suggest it, but you’ll have to go back to the war.”

Bucky closes his eyes. When he opens them, he’s strapped to a table in Austria. Zola’s cruel face and round glasses peer at him from above. “It is time, Herr Sergeant,” Zola says. He flicks a syringe, and Bucky squirms. Zola stops his motion and sticks the syringe in his arm.

Bucky screams. “I’m so sorry,” Simmons says.

Fire shoots through Bucky’s veins. “Sergeant,” Bucky says. “Three, two, five, five, seven, zero, three, eight. Sergeant. Three, two, five, five, seven, zero, three, eight.”

“He’s stuck in a loop,” Fitz says.

“Pull him out!” Skye yells.

“No,” Simmons says. “He’s so close.”

“Sergeant,” Bucky says. “Three, two, five… five…”

“Bucky? Oh, my god.”

“We’ve gone too far,” Simmons says.

“It’s like his memory is hot-wired to this bloke,” Fitz says.

“‘This bloke’ is Captain America,” Skye says. “He’s remembering Captain America.”

Bucky closes his eyes. When he opens them, he’s strapped to a table in Austria. Zola’s cruel face and round glasses peer at him from above. “It is time, Herr Sergeant,” Zola says. He flicks a syringe, and Bucky squirms.

“You can’t put him through this again!” Skye says.

“I’m trying to go back,” Simmons says. “Sergeant Barnes—focus on Dr. Zola. Focus on what that man did to you.”

Bucky closes his eyes. When he opens them, he’s strapped to a table in Austria. Zola’s cruel face and round glasses peer at him from above. “How is he adjusting to the serum?” Zola asks, turning to a man in a lab coat.

“The subject is adapting,” the lab coat says. He clicks his pen. “Still, it could take years to reprogram him. Decades, even.”

“We need something faster,” Zola says, peering at Bucky appraisingly. “Prepare him for further experimentation.”

“Did Zola work with Cybertek?” Skye asks, her voice quiet and scared.

“We know he worked with Hydra well into this century,” Fitz says. “It’s possible that Zola worked on Deathlok.”

“Probable, I’d say,” Simmons adds. “But not yet. Right now, he’s building the Winter Soldier.”

A SHIELD agent is waiting for Steve when he crashes into the bus. She’s about half Steve’s size, with straight black hair and a neutral expression. She isn’t visibly carrying a weapon.

“Take me to Coulson,” Steve says.

“No,” the agent says. “Captain.”

Steve can sense another presence behind him, and he turns to see Natasha behind him. When had she entered the bus?

“May,” Nat says.

“Romanoff.”

“We’ve got to stop meeting like this.”

“I’m not bothered.” May jerks her head at Steve. “Cap’s with you?”

Natasha nods.

May turns and heads down a hallway without another word.

Natasha follows her.

Steve trails after them both.

May leads Steve and Natasha to the lowest level of the bus, a narrow white room with a containment unit in its center. Two young agents stand with their foreheads pressed to the window of the unit, blocking Steve’s view of what’s inside.

But he knows what's inside. “Bucky,” Steve mutters, running to the containment unit. “Bucky!”

The young agents turn. One rushes out of Steve’s way, but the other stands her ground, her chin in the air. “Don’t distract him,” she says. “If you cooperate, he’ll be out of the memory machine in no time.”

Steve shoots daggers through the glass. He sees a woman with a brown ponytail and a lab coat hovering over a man on a table.

“Bucky!” Steve yells, pounding on the window. The containment unit shakes, and he leaves a small crack in the glass.

“Careful!” the third agent yells. He has a Scottish accent and a skittish demeanor, but he glowers at Steve with authority. “You’re gonna break it!”

“Damn right I will,” Steve says. He turns to the female agent. “Let me in.”

“With all due respect, Captain—no.” She puts her hand on Steve’s and tries to pull it off the glass. It doesn’t budge.

“Let me.” Natasha’s voice, coming closer. Steve feels a hand on his shoulder and knows that it’s hers.

“Fitz, Skye, fall back,” May says, from somewhere behind Steve and Natasha. The two SHIELD agents back out of Steve’s view, and Natasha walks into it. 

“Let Agent Simmons do her job,” Natasha says. She nods to the ponytailed woman in the containment unit. “She’s a doctor.”

“She’s hurting him!”

“He asked us to!” The Scottish voice—Agent Fitz. “Begged us to, actually.” 

“Fitz.” May’s voice, a warning. “I said fall back.”

Steve pokes his thumb into the crack in the window. Agent Simmons blocks his view of Bucky’s face, but Steve can see his legs twitch, can hear a faint string of whimpers. It hurts like a physical wound—Steve can feel what they’re doing to him.

“He wants to remember,” Natasha says. “You have to let him.”

Steve wants to say that he doesn’t have to let them do shit, but he knows Natasha’s right. He removes his hand from the glass and rips his gaze from the window. Natasha’s expression is blank, always blank, but the scattering of SHIELD agents around the room look scared.

Steve feels guilty for causing that fear. He sticks his hands in the air and looks at Agents Fitz and Skye. “I'm sorry for scaring you,” he says.

“S’all good, Cap,” Skye says, waving her hand and shrugging. “Can I call you Cap?”

“My name is Steve,” Steve says. “Steve Rogers.”

“Roger that, Rogers,” Skye says. She holds out her hand. “I’m Skye.”

Steve walks forward and shakes her hand. “Nice to meet you, Skye,” he says.

A scream tears Steve’s attention from the agent. He rushes back to the containment unit and presses his hands to the glass, careful not to damage it further. “Bucky!”

Natasha’s hand is on his shoulder once more. “Steve,” she warns.

“Why don’t we get the Captain a drink?” May asks. “He looks like he needs one.”

Natasha raises an eyebrow at Steve, who lets out a sigh.

“Fine,” he says. “But as soon as I can see Bucky, you’ll let me.”

Bucky is squirming away from Dr. Zola when he hears Steve’s disembodied voice. “Bucky,” it says. “Bucky!”

Then he hears Simmons’ voice, softer: “Don’t lose focus.”

Bucky concentrates on Zola. He isn’t on the table in Kreischberg anymore, but in Siberia—this is after the fall. Bucky's left arm is gone and his right arm is shackled to the table, by his wrist and again at his bicep. Similar straps hold down his waist and legs.

“You will be the fist of Hydra,” Zola says.

“In your twisted dreams,” Bucky replies.

“We know all of this already,” Simmons says. “You don’t have to relive it.”

“Bucky!”

“Steve?” Bucky says. “Is that—is he here?”

“Stay with me,” Simmons says. “When did you first work with Cybertek?”

The Soldier stands in an airy lobby, holding a rifle to his chest. The logo behind reception reads CYBERTEK.

“Your work here is admirable,” says Alexander Pierce.

“Damn right I will. Let me in.”

“Steve?”

“Focus,” Simmons says. It's becoming Bucky's least favorite word.

Pierce is in his fifties or sixties, a younger man than Bucky saw at the Triskelion. Pierce walks to the reception desk and rests his elbows on the table, then looks into the receptionist’s eyes. “You’ll tell your boss that we’ve arrived,” he says. He gestures for the Soldier to join him. The receptionist withers, folding into himself at the Soldier’s gaze. He brings a phone to his ear with shaking hands and says, “Secretary Pierce and the Asset are here, sir.”

The Soldier hears the voice on the other end of the line say, “Send them up.”

“She’s hurting him!”

“He asked us to! Begged us to, actually.”

“Steve?” Bucky tries to move, but finds that he can’t. “Who’s hurting Steve?”

“Captain Rogers is safe,” Simmons says. “Sergeant Barnes, who was the man on the phone?”

The Soldier follows Pierce into a sleek elevator. The CYBERTEK logo is emblazoned on its doors—it seems to be everywhere. They rise to the fourth floor and get off, Pierce walking down the hallway with purpose, like he owns the place.

For all the Soldier knows, he does.

Pierce walks to the end of the hallway, to a door marked CEO. “Wait here,” he tells the Soldier, and walks inside.

The Soldier dutifully stands outside the door. He could hear their conversation if he tried, but it’s not important to the mission.

“Who’s on the other side of that door?” Simmons asks. “Did you ever meet the CEO?”

“I met the man in charge,” Bucky says.

Pierce exits the room looking smug. “Come,” he tells the Soldier, heading for the elevator.

“Who is the man in charge of Cybertek?” Simmons asks.

In the elevator, Pierce pats his pockets and lets out a muffled curse. “Soldat,” he says. “Retrieve my pager from the CEO’s office.”

When the elevator opens to the lobby, Pierce presses 4 and steps out. The Soldier watches the doors close and feels the elevator rise, then gets out on the fourth floor. He walks down the hallway until he reaches the door marked CEO. He pushes it open.

A man sits at a desk in the center of the room. Pierce’s pager vibrates on the edge of it, threatening to fall.

The Soldier approaches the desk and grips the pager with his metal hand.

The CEO doesn't recognize him. “Tell Mr. Pierce to be more careful with his things,” says Howard Stark.

Agent May does nothing to hide the apprehension in her tone. “Why?” she says into her comms. Then, “Copy that.” She looks at Steve and Natasha. “Do you two have a line to Tony Stark?”

Bucky stares at Howard, the memory paused. “Coulson,” Simmons says, her voice drifting into the room. “Howard Stark ran Cybertek until his death in 1991.”

A car crash on the side of the road, vials of blue serum in the trunk—

“We can pull you out now, Sergeant Barnes,” Simmons says. “Unless—”

His metal hand squeezes a blonde woman’s throat while her husband bleeds out in the driver’s seat—

“I want to remember,” Bucky says. A muffled choking sound, but the Soldier just squeezes and kills—

“Of course, Sergeant Barnes,” Simmons says. “Focus on your earliest memory, and we’ll work our way from there.”

“Coulson,” Steve says. His drink lays abandoned on the counter, and Natasha has left to find Tony. Agent May nurses a beer while Agents Fitz and Skye bicker and laugh over a pool table.

Coulson stands in the doorway. Steve has never met a man so relaxed in relation to his circumstances.

“Let’s have a chat,” Coulson says.

Steve stands from the counter and follows him out of the room. They walk to an office—Coulson sits behind the desk and gestures for Steve to sit across from him.

Steve remains standing.

“You must be confused,” Coulson says.

“Try furious.” Steve puts his hands on the desk and stares down Coulson, who looks as relaxed as a tourist on a beach.

“Barnes consented to use of the memory machine,” Coulson says. “He wants to reclaim what Hydra took from him.”

“You should have called me as soon as you found him.”

“With all due respect, Cap, I don’t take orders from you.” Coulson gestures again to the empty chair, and this time, Steve sits in it.

“Fury?” Steve asks.

“He wants to know what we’re dealing with,” Coulson says. “Everything that wasn’t in the data dump.”

“How do you know that Bucky has the information you’re looking for?”

“Because he found it,” Coulson says. “Cybertek—the company that experimented on Barnes—was led by Howard Stark.”

Steve is quiet as he absorbs this information.

“He thought he was working for SHIELD,” Coulson adds.

“So did I.” Steve closes his eyes and takes a breath. “So Howard—his technology—that’s what controlled Bucky?”

“Not exactly,” Coulson says. “Howard was involved with the first Deathlok—a man named John Garrett—in the eighties and nineties. The eye tech came later.”

“Can your team remove his tracker?” Steve asks.

“Of course,” Coulson says. “Let Simmons do her job, and she'll remove all of Cybertek's technology from Barnes.”

Bucky’s childhood flashes through his mind in a slideshow. He lived in Indiana as a kid, then moved to Brooklyn. He sees himself and his sisters run around Prospect Park, then sees himself with Steve—walking to the streetcar, laughing at the Automat, reading comics in each other’s beds. Bucky is five, then ten, then fifteen—he remembers growing up in record time.

He kisses Steve for the first time at seventeen. They’re on Steve’s fire escape—Steve sketches while Bucky smokes a cigarette, trying not to stare too obviously at him. It’s summer and it’s hot; they have no choice but to sweat, and Bucky hopes he doesn’t smell like BO. But Steve appears unbothered, his pencil scratching paper while Bucky breathes smoke into his lungs.

When his cigarette is done, Bucky flicks it off of the fire escape and watches it fall to the street. “Whatcha drawing?” he asks.

“You,” Steve says. He turns the page around, and Bucky’s stomach flips. He reaches for his image on the page, but his fingers brush Steve’s. They spark and turn Bucky’s cheeks a vibrant red.

Steve smirks and leans forward, a teasing glint in his eyes. “That bad, huh?”

“Stevie, it’s brilliant.” Bucky takes Steve’s hand. “You’re brilliant.”

Steve takes Bucky’s jaw in his hands, holding his face like it’s fragile, and kisses him.

The fire escape disappears, and Bucky is strapped to Zola’s table. He takes in his surroundings—the room is brightly lit, so he must be in Siberia. Based on the tech in the room—medical equipment, wires and monitors—it’s shortly after Bucky’s fall.

Zola saunters into the room and grins at Bucky. “Your Captain is dead,” he says.

“Liar,” Bucky hisses.

Zola laughs, a low sound. He holds up a portable radio, and sound spills out— “Come in. This is Captain Rogers. Do you read me?”

Bucky’s hand twitches toward the voice. “Steve—”

“Steve, is that you? Are you alright?”

“Peggy! Schmidt’s dead.”

“What about the plane?”

“That’s a little bit tougher to explain.”

“No…” Bucky whispers, his throat scratchy and sore. “Steve…”

“There’s not going to be a safe landing. But I can try and force it down.”

Bucky’s body goes cold. “No—”

Zola turns off the radio and sets it down. “We exterminated your Captain, Herr Sergeant,” Zola says. "From now on, he will always be dead."

And for the next seventy years, Bucky feels it. He feels Steve's death in every jolt, cut, pinch, scrape, bruise—in every modicum of harm he used to run from, in every Nazi that he used to fight against—he feels Steve's death in his veins, cooling his blood, slowing Bucky's heart rate to a beat. If Steve is dead forever, then Bucky is the shadow of his ghost—he waits within the curvatures of time to reunite with his lost love, bemoaning his own inability to die and to stay dead.

“He’s out of the memory machine,” Coulson tells him. “Simmons is prepping the OR.”

Steve stands, sloshing some whiskey on the bartop. “When can I see him?”

“As soon as he wakes up from surgery,” Coulson says.

Steve wraps his hands around the dripping glass. “What about Tony?”

“Romanoff is contacting him now,” Coulson says. “Seeing if he has Howard’s old files. We’ll take it from there.”

Steve looks down at Coulson and nods. “Thank you,” he says. He pauses. “I was glad to hear you weren’t dead.”

“I had a good reason not to be,” Coulson says.

“This team,” Steve says. “They need you?”

“As much as I need them.”

Bucky’s first order arrives when he opens his eyes. “Don’t scare me like that,” Steve says, looking at him in his hospital bed. “Ever again.”

“No promises,” Bucky croaks. He tries to sit up, but feels Steve’s gentle hand push him down.

“Rest,” Steve says.

“You got anything but orders for me, punk?”

Steve grins. “Jerk. I missed you.” He cups Bucky’s face, strokes his cheek, and lets go.

Bucky reaches his hand and takes Steve’s. “I missed you, too.”

“Do you have all your memories back?”

“Yes,” Bucky says. He runs his thumb along Steve’s knuckles. “I remember everything.”

Steve blushes. His hand sweats in Bucky’s.

Bucky squeezes it. “I wanted to kill you,” he says. “Before I saw you on the bridge.”

“You didn’t know me,” Steve whispers.

“I do now,” Bucky says. “You’re why I didn’t stay dead.”

ONE MONTH LATER

- ⍟ -

Steve likes his D.C. apartment now. The paintings on the walls reflect his taste—Bucky bought him some prints at a flea market, even learned how to order them online—and the furniture is comfortable, lived in. Ever since Bucky moved in here, the apartment has felt like a home.

In the morning, Steve rolls out of bed, walks to the living room, and looks fondly at Bucky on the couch. Then he starts a pot of coffee and makes breakfast, puts leftovers in the fridge for when Bucky wakes up, and goes on his morning jog. He meets Sam at the reflecting pool, matches his pace and watches the sun rise as they run. At the end of their route, Steve waves goodbye to Sam and jogs home, pulls off his sticky clothes and takes a shower. When he walks out of the bathroom, towel held loosely to his groin, Bucky is yawning awake.

“Morning,” Steve says. He walks by the couch to ruffle Bucky’s hair, earning a scowl, before heading to his room. He pulls on a t-shirt and a pair of thin sweatpants, then heads back to the living room.

In the month since Bucky moved in, they’ve tiptoed around each other’s feelings. Steve tries to keep their conversations light, and Bucky follows suit—they don’t talk about Hydra or Cybertek or all of Bucky’s nightmares, just Sam and Natasha and the weather. But this morning, with the sun hitting Bucky in the face and trailing down his neck, Steve can’t take it anymore. He needs to know.

“How do you feel?” Steve asks. He sits next to Bucky on the couch.

“M’fine,” Bucky says with a shrug. “Bit tired.”

“No,” Steve says. “How do you feel about me?”

Bucky’s eyes widen and his cheeks turn red. “Uh,” Bucky says. “Good?”

“Jerk,” Steve says. He yanks Bucky’s arm forward and kisses him.

Bucky’s hand flies up to Steve’s jaw and he digs his nails into the soft skin there. He kisses Steve back, softly at first, then quickens his pace and scratches his nails down Steve’s neck.

Steve lets out a soft gasp and breaks apart. “Bucky?” he asks.

Bucky wraps his hand around Steve’s and looks up at him.

“Did you mean what you said on the bus?” Steve’s heart pounds, and he’s embarrassed; he knows that Bucky can hear the quickened beat.

“Hm?”

“You said that I was why you didn’t stay dead,” Steve says. “Why you resisted Hydra—why you fought so hard to find yourself again.”

Bucky blushes. He nods.

Steve brings his free hand to Bucky’s cheek. “We’ll find another reason,” he says. “You need more in your life than just me.”

Bucky considers this. “Okay,” he says. “Then I’ll befriend Natasha, too.”

THE END