Archive of Our Own

 “Hi Steve.”

“Bucky? How—?” Steve’s grip tightened on his phone and he had to consciously relax his hand. Idiot, it doesn’t matter how he got the number. Just be glad he has it. “Where are you?”

“Right now? In Prospect Park. Near the bridge. Remember?”

Steve felt the knot in his gut that he’d been carrying around since he found out Bucky was alive loosen a little. He was in New York. In Brooklyn. Bucky had finally come home. “How could I forget? We drank our first beer there….”

He heard a rusty sounding laugh from Bucky.

“Your first beer, Rogers. Mine, not so much.”

“I’m on my way, Buck. You’re going to stay put, right? You’ll be there when I get there?”

“Yeah.”

“I’m glad you’re home, Bucky. Really glad.”

“See you soon.”

The amount of time it took to get there was excruciating. Traffic never seemed to move slower—thirty-eight minutes to get to the park and another ten to get to the bridge.

Bucky was still there.

Thank God.

He was wearing an overcoat that was a little too warm looking for the temperature of the day, a leather glove on his metal hand, and a cap pulled down low to obscure his face. Shaggy hair stuck out from under the cap and he looked like he hadn’t shaved for a few days, but it was Bucky, right here in New York.

Finally….

Steve put down the bag he was carrying. “It’s about time.”

He threw an arm around Bucky’s shoulder and pulled him into a hug, clapping him on the back with the other. “I’ve been worried about you, jerk. When you showed up at that fight in London, I figured….”

He could feel the tension in Bucky’s stance, but he didn’t pull away.

“Yeah…. I wasn’t ready. Sorry.”

Steve let go and looked Bucky in the eye. “That’s ok, Buck. I’m just glad you’re here now.”

He grinned and reached into the bag on the grass and pulled out a six pack. “I brought beer.”

That got a slight smile from Bucky. “Captain America drinking in the park? Wait’ll the papers get a load of that.”

Tossing Bucky a can, he said, “We didn’t get caught when we were kids. We can handle it now. Besides, people don’t recognise me much without the uniform.”

They sat down on the bank, the bag of beer between them, drinking in silence for a while. Steve couldn’t remember the last time he’d felt this happy.

After a bit, Bucky said, “You find a way to make beer work for ya, or is this still basically water?”

“Water, but that’s not the point.”

Bucky nodded.

“You got your arm fixed.”

“Fury. He’s how I got back here, too, but that’s hush-hush.” Bucky took a sip of his beer and looked out across the stream in front of them.

“Fury? But he’s in hiding.”

“Didn’t stop him from leaving me a way to contact him at a dead drop about six months ago, or from bringing back here when I called him after I saw you last. He may be in hiding, but he’s got his fingers in everybody’s pie.”

Steve took a sip of his own beer. It might not do anything for him, but he still liked the taste and sitting in the park drinking with Bucky like they’d done when they were kids…he liked that even more.

He wasn’t as sure where Bucky’s head was at. “So…I know what you were In London to do. You helped me out, instead, and got your arm mangled doing it, but…that was a crappy plan, Buck, going in alone with the odds so against you getting out again. You didn’t plan on walking away from it, did you?”

“You know about that, huh?” Bucky stared at his beer can for a while before saying, “I didn’t think I’d make it out, no, but taking out Hydra’s leadership in one move…it seemed worth it.”

Steve punched him in the shoulder hard enough to knock him sideways and make him slosh beer on himself. “Not to me, it doesn’t.”

Bucky tried to wipe the beer off his coat. “Damn it, Rogers, now I’m going to smell like a bum.”

“Goes with the look you got going. You get allergic to barbers or something?”

Smiling slightly, Bucky said “That hasn’t been a priority and good thing, too. Might not have been there to pull your punk ass out of the fire, otherwise.”

He took a drink. “Speaking of which…when did men start going to beauty parlors? Haven’t seen a proper barber anywhere.”

“I dunno. Weird, huh? I found one though. It’s a good shop. I’ll give you the address.”

“Okay, thanks.”

They drank for a while longer and just…being there.

Steve was thinking about how great it was to see Bucky–here and alive, thinking about how strange the world had been for him at first and how damn separate from it he’d felt.

He looked at Bucky and said, “Bucky… This is a hard world to get used to. Come stay with me for a while, huh?”

Bucky shook his head. “That’s not a good idea, Steve. Besides, I got some stuff I need to do. Fury didn’t bring me back here to sit on my ass and I owe him. Fixing this arm didn’t come cheap.”

“You sure you want to do that? You don’t have to.”

“Yeah, I do. I pay my debts and there’s nothing he can want me to do that’ll be worse than what I was doing before. Besides, what am I gonna do, take up lawn bowling?  Get a job in some office?”

“You could join the Avengers. Fight beside me again.”

Bucky gave a laugh that was tinged with bitterness. “Yeah, that’d work out great, Steve. Even if your buddies were ok with you adding a mass murderer to the team, it’s too risky. The press would figure it out. I didn’t exactly keep a low profile when I came after you.”

Damn it. “You’re not a mass murderer, Bucky. That wasn’t you.”

“Those people died because of me, Steve. It doesn’t matter how I got there. It’s still on me.”

“No, it’s on Hydra. It’s not your fault.”

Bucky scowled, drank the last of his beer and tossed the can in the bag. “It doesn’t matter whose fault it is. The blood’s still on my hands.” He took another beer out of the bag and opened it. “I’m not as good a man as you think I am, Steve. I never was. Maybe Fury can give me a chance to be a better one.”

Steve frowned at Bucky. “I know who you are. I know who you still are. I know you, Bucky. I know you’re going to beat yourself up and if you can’t do that enough, you’ll bite off more than you can chew and let the bad guys do it for you.”

Bucky’s lips tightened, then he said, “I’m fine. Give it a rest.”

“Ok, then. Prove it. Come stay with me for a few weeks and show me how fine you are.”

His brow furrowing, Bucky said, “You’re not going to let this go, are you, ya stubborn bastard?”

“Nope. Learned it from you.”

Bucky let out a sigh. “Ok. I have something I have to do first, but I’ll see you in a couple weeks.” His mouth pulled to one side in a wry smile. “That works out ok, actually. Fury’s getting me a place, but I have to wait until next month.”

“And I’m the stubborn bastard? You could have just said that and saved us ten minutes of bullshit.”

“Just open a beer. I’m drinking alone here.”

Steve opened another can.

————————————————————————————-

Steve opened the door at Bucky’s knock, grinning. He knew it was Bucky. He’d heard that knock for most of his life. “Come on in.”

On seeing Bucky’s face, the smile dimmed. “Jesus, Buck. What’s the other guy look like?”

Bucky was sporting a fading shiner, a cut on his neck with an alarming number of stitches, and a smaller cut on his cheek.

“The other guy looks dead—along with about twenty of his buddies. Fury’s intel was a little off. That or terrorists breed like rabbits in close quarters. If I’d known how many of them there were in that bunker, I would have approached things a little differently. Worked out ok, though. The hostages got out alive. Boy, I had to fight fast to make that happen, though.”

Steve stepped back to give Bucky enough room to carry his duffle bag through the door, which he did then put it down next to the sofa. It made an audible clunking sound when it hit the floor.

Lifting an eyebrow, Steve said, “Tell me all your worldly goods aren’t guns.”

“Nah. I have knives, too.” He laughed when he looked at Steve’s face. “I’m kidding, Steve. I have what I need.”

“In one duffle bag?”

“I don’t need much—and I have most of my weapons stashed elsewhere, so there was room for a change of clothes in there.”

Steve shook his head. “Go wash up. I made spaghetti.”

Bucky’s eyebrows rose hopefully. “Your mom’s recipe?”

“As close as I can make it.”

Bucky swore the sauce tasted exactly the same. Steve didn’t think so, but maybe that was because his mom didn’t make it and that had been part of it for him. It was still good.

They didn’t talk about the war, Hydra, fighting or killing anyone or anything. They just talked about being kids and while they did, Steve thought Bucky looked as at ease and happy as he felt.

He grinned at Bucky. “Remember when my mom caught you sneaking a smoke on our fire escape?”

Bucky laughed. “Hell, yeah. Did she tear a strip off me, or what? Don’t think she gave a damn about me smoking, though. She was just pissed I was smoking around you.”

They sat at the table trading stories about family and the old neighborhood until late into the night.

For the first time since he’d woken up in that fake room S.H.I.E.L.D. had put together in a misguided attempt to ease his entry into the twenty-first century, Steve felt like a person who really fit right in the world.

————————————————————————————-

The next morning, Bucky was woken very early by the ringing of the doorbell. The angle of the light shining through the window told him it was a little after dawn. “Steve, door! Wake you, you lazy bugger.”

“Who you calling lazy?” Steve came out of the bathroom wiping his face with a hand towel and looking freshly shaved. He looked through the peephole then at Bucky. “It’s Sam. I forgot to cancel our run, darn it. You ok with me letting him in?”

Sam. Sam Wilson. Flying guy he’d done his best to kill while his programming was intact. Well, bloody hell. So much for keeping a low profile. Bucky stood, running a hand through sleep tangled hair and made his way to the automatic coffee maker that Steve had explained the night before. He poured himself a cup. “No help for it. Let him in.”

When Wilson came inside, he was as easy to read as a book. (A). Big grin, hello Steve. (B.) Hmm, rough looking guy with marks of a beating in Steve’s kitchen. (C). Jesus fucking Christ.Winter Soldier!

Yeah. This was going to go great.

Wilson looked at Steve, all lowered brow and dubious expression.

“It’s ok, Sam. Really. Everything’s fine. Sorry, I meant to cancel today’s run. Bucky just got back into town. Bucky, get Sam a cup of coffee, all right?

Bucky got Sam the coffee as requested and put cream and sugar on the coffee table. If he’d been in a laughing mood, Wilson’s discomfort at being handed coffee by the Winter Soldier would have been hysterical.

Moving away from the sofa to an armchair where he wouldn’t have to sit with his back to Bucky, Wilson said, “Kinda thought you weren’t coming back when you left after the fight.”

Bucky looked at Wilson for a moment, wondering where he was going with this, then said, “The time wasn’t right.”

Steve was frowning at his buddy, Sam.

“I guess no time was right during the last year when Steve was busting his butt looking for you either, huh? You show up for one fight, out of the blue, then bail again…. So what makes now the right time? What’s your real business here?”

Steve was getting that mulish expression on his face he’d always got when people tried to look out for him when he didn’t want it.

“That’s uncalled for, Sam. I invited Bucky to stay with me for a few weeks. There’s no secret agenda.”

Steve’s phone rang and he answered it. “Hello? Yeah, that’s me…. Ok, I’ll be right down.”

Bucky sat down on the sofa and didn’t say anything. It was good that Steve had people who cared about him—who looked out for him. If he’d been Wilson, he would have thought this smelled, too.

Didn’t mean he wouldn’t have liked to punch him in the head.

Steve looked at them both. “That was UPS. I’m going downstairs to collect a registered letter. You two…don’t wreak the furniture. I’ll be right back.”

After Steve left, Bucky and Wilson stared at each other for a minute, then Wilson said, “Yeah, this isn’t awkward at all. Look, sorry if I came off like an asshole, but Steve has a blind spot a mile wide where you’re concerned.”

“It’s ok. I wouldn’t trust me, either.” Bucky took a drink of coffee, not taking his eyes off Wilson.

“Should I?”

“Where you’re talking about Steve, yeah. If I ever do anything to harm him, you can shoot me in the head and I won’t even try to stop you.”  

Thing is, Wilson wouldn’t have to. If he ever did anything to bring harm to Steve, he’d fix it, or die trying. That was just how it was. This guy didn’t have a clue.

Wilson nodded. “And if I was talking about something else?”

“Then it would depend on what you were talking about.”

“How about you blowing up whatever the hell you want with no sanction and no back up?”

“Hydra? Why do you care about that? You don’t think they deserve what’s coming to them?”

“You’re with deciding who’s innocent and who’s guilty all by your lonesome and handing out the executions. You think that’s just fine?”

Bucky just looked at him. Had Wilson not been paying attention to what Hydra was? He should have trusted his instincts about coming here. This was a bad idea. And this jerk was starting to get his goat.

“Guess that’s a yes.” Wilson looked at him for a couple more minutes then said, “Lotta guys…they’d have trouble dealing with what happened to you.”

“I’m fine.” Bucky put his coffee down.

“You could have come home, Barnes, but you didn’t. You just switched targets.”

Bucky leaned forward and put his cup down. “Do we have a problem?”

“Concerns, not a problem.” Wilson put his cup down, too.

“Ok, then. You be concerned and I’ll ignore it. Because it’s none of your damn business.” Bucky leaned back again and watched Wilson.

They were still staring at each other when Steve came back in the room holding an official looking yellow envelope. He took one look at them, threw the envelope down and said, “Damn it. You two look like a couple of tom cats in a face off.”

Bucky stood. “I told you this was a bad idea, Steve. I’m not what this jerk thinks, but I’m not who you think, either. And I didn’t come here for the third degree from Flyboy, here.”

Steve moved to block his path. “Not a damn chance, Bucky. I really don’t care who you think you are right now. Sit your butt back down and don’t even think about leaving.”

He had that look that Steve got when he was really getting pissed off and frustrated. Bucky knew that look. Since he wasn’t that interested in making Steve go ballistic, he sat down, but he wasn’t happy, and didn’t bother to hide it.

Steve turned on Wilson. “What the hell, Sam?”

“Sorry, Steve. I know you wanted to find him—I even helped you try, but I didn’t think you were going to just invite him to sleep on your sofa with no medical assessment, observation or security. This is nuts.”

Wilson looked at Bucky. “Look, I wouldn’t normally push a guy in your situation like I just did, but you’ve spent every moment of your freedom getting revenge, a literal firestorm of it. You’ve been killing whoever you felt like, whenever and wherever you felt like doing it. I don’t want Steve to end up knee deep in your shit—I needed to know how you’d react if your buttons got pushed.”

Bucky spread his arms out on the top of the sofa, looking relaxed, but very much ready to move. He narrowed his eyes. “And?”

“And I don’t think you’re going to try to rip Steve’s arms off if he burns your toast. Outside that…” Wilson shrugged. “I’m a paramedic, not a shrink. I’m guessing that you think you’ve boot-strapped your way out of the worst of where your head’s been at over the last year or so, but your solo blood feud says something different than that to me.”

Wilson picked up his coat. “Maybe you think this is no different than what you and Steve did during the war, but then, you were part of a team. You were following orders and you had the backing of your government. Now you’re just killing people you think are a threat.”

Bucky stared at him for a moment. “I know they’re a threat. I know better than anyone that they’re a fucking threat.”

Jackass…. He couldn’t actually disagree with the guy trying to figure out if he was going to slit Steve’s throat while he slept, but he didn’t have to like it. He’d never had a high tolerance for bullshit.

Steve still looked pissed, but he walked Wilson to the door, saying something quietly that Bucky didn’t try to hear.

————————————————————————————-

The small barbershop was full of men who found it a novelty rather than the normal place to get a shave and a haircut that Bucky and Steve did, but that didn’t make it any less popular.

Bucky looked startled by the prices then laughed. “I don’t know why it surprises me to see a shave and a haircut for twenty-five bucks when I pay over a grand for a handgun. Should have guessed.”

Steve glanced at the TV on the wall in the waiting area. The Yankees were playing.

Oh crap. Bucky probably didn’t know.

He leaned over to Bucky and whispered, “I forgot to tell you, Buck. The Dodgers moved to Los Angeles.”

Bucky stared at him, his mouth opening to speak and then closing again.

Steve knew how he felt. The Dodgers left Brooklyn. That was way more unbelievable than anything else he’d woken up to.  

Finally, Bucky managed to say, “You’re shitting me. When?”

“1956. The Giants went to San Francisco at the same time.”

“The hell they did. I’m supposed to root for the Yankees now? Can’t do it, Steve. No way.” Bucky shook his head in disbelief. “You root for the Yankees?”

“Nah, the Mets. A team that didn’t exist when the Dodgers were around is a lot easier to root for than the Yankees. It’s not the same, though.”

Bucky grimaced. “I guess not. Damn.”

When the first chair became available, Steve motioned Bucky to go ahead. Bucky really did look kind of like a bum, although he never would say so, joking aside.

Steve didn’t need a haircut yet, but he wasn’t going to miss out on a shave. A barbershop shave with hot towels and a straight razor was still the best shave known to man. Even taking the second chair that freed up, he was done before Bucky.

About half an hour later, Bucky got up from his chair and walked back over to the waiting area, the swagger in his step and smirk on his clean shaven face making him look a hell of a lot more like the Sergeant Barnes who’d always had a girl or two on his arm. He’d left a lot more of the hair than Steve would have, but it was pretty clear that he felt like a million bucks, and that was the main thing.

Steve grinned at him. That was more like it—even with the shiner and stitches.

————————————————————————————-

In the small hours of the morning, Steve was woken up by Bucky talking in the living room. Would he have let someone in? Who the hell would come over at three in the morning?

Steve pulled on his pants and made his way to the living room.

There was no one there. It was Bucky arguing with someone in his sleep.

That was private stuff. Steve knew the kind of crap that came up in his dreams and he wasn’t going listen while Bucky’s sleeping self rummaged through his.

He’d turned away when he heard Bucky mumble, “There was no mention of a child…need details or I can’t do my job….”

Steve stopped in his tracks. Jesus, Bucky. What did they make you do?

“Wasn’t necessary…girl’s not a threat…. Am following orders… there was no need to so I….”

Oh, thank God.

Steve went back to his room, leaving Bucky to his unnerving mental housekeeping before he heard anything else that Bucky wouldn’t want him hearing.

He climbed back into bed and pounded his pillow then turned to lie on his back. Closing his eyes, he took a deep breath. He let this happen to Bucky. He should have been faster. He should have gotten to him before he fell. He should have gotten off that train, gone into that valley and looked for him. He shouldn’t have let this happen.

God, Bucky, I’m so sorry….

His mind was running over all the assassinations that Bucky had been responsible for that they knew of—and there were a lot of them—brutal, efficient murders without a trace of evidence left behind unless he wanted it to be there—a calling card, so to speak.. No children that Steve knew of, but plenty of spouses and probably orphans waiting at home.

Then there were the ‘accidents’ that were far too convenient to actually be accidental. He didn’t think the low level stuff was Bucky—cut brake lines, and the like. They wouldn’t waste the Winter Soldier on stuff like that, but some of them would have taken skill and coordination of multiple factors on the fly. He figured those were Bucky.

He’d seen Bucky in action during the war and he knew what his handiwork looked like. People thought war was just shooting and dropping bombs, but it was messier and uglier than they could imagine and the Howling Commandos had seen the worst of it.

When they’d needed something done quickly and quietly, it had been Bucky that did it, whether it was gathering intelligence behind enemy lines, or crawling under a swath of barb wire to eliminate sentries silently by cutting their throats.

Sure, he’d been good at blowing stuff up—and very good at shooting at it—but…the stuff that Captain America couldn’t be seen doing because he was Captain America, the stuff the other Commandos weren’t as good at…that was all Bucky’s. All the really nasty stuff.

Bucky had never said anything about it or shown any sign that it bothered him, but it bothered Steve now.

If he was honest with himself, he had to admit that Bucky was never quite the same after being captured by Zola. There’s been an unspoken anger in him and he’d been quieter, laughed less often.

They’d all done the things they were best at and Bucky…well, he’d really been the best at what he did, but looking back, Steve wondered if maybe there’d been something he could have done differently. He didn’t know, but he didn’t feel great about it, either way. He felt like they’d used Bucky, too. Not the same way and not without his consent, but…it didn’t feel totally different, even though he knew Bucky would give him a punch if he ever said that.

The file Natasha got from Kiev…it said Hydra had started freezing Bucky between missions because they his programming was less reliable the longer he was awake. He must have been fighting them on some level the whole time.

Bucky was still fighting, only now he was fighting to live with what they’d made him do. Damn it. Maybe Sam was right.

When he’d been leaving the apartment, Sam had said that Bucky was going to need help getting over what’d happened to him and that he was one bad hair day away from a slaughter of the younglings. Steve hadn’t gotten the reference, but he knew what Sam was saying. Sam thought Bucky might lose it and do something that was way more Winter Soldier than Bucky.

Steve also knew that wasn’t true. Bucky was still Bucky even if he didn’t believe it right now, and Sam had no idea who Bucky was, not really. He didn’t know what it had been like, fighting the Red Skull’s Hydra and the Nazis. He didn’t know the things they’d seen or how determined that could make a man to never let anything like that happen again, no matter the cost.

To end up fighting for them instead of against them…. That would be unbearable. It was no surprise to Steve that Bucky was so determined to end Hydra once and for all—and once again, Bucky was doing the ugly job that needed doing.

Bucky would never stop fighting for what he thought was right. Not now that he was himself again. Hell, he’d never stopped. He just hadn’t known what ‘right’ was.

The part that worried Steve wasn’t that Bucky might lose control or hurt bystanders, it was what he might be willing to do to himself to achieve his goals. He’d already gone on one suicide mission and it was luck that he’d been turned away from it. Bucky just didn’t think he was as important as taking out Hydra and that was a problem.

Thing was, S.H.I.E.L.D. was gone and their doctors were gone with it. Even if they hadn’t been, Steve was pretty sure that Bucky would see going to a shrink as just more messing around with his head and there was no way to make him go. If anyone could have, it had been Fury, with the repair of Bucky’s arm as leverage, but Fury hadn’t done that. Maybe Fury didn’t have anyone he trusted with Bucky, either.

He thought about getting in touch with Fury, but rejected the idea. He didn’t want to screw up what Bucky had going. It gave him purpose and Steve knew Bucky needed that.

He’d find Natasha. Maybe she’d know what to do. She was the only one who might really understand what Bucky was living with.

————————————————————————————-

“Hi Natasha, it’s Steve. You in town?”

Natasha smiled to herself. Steve often felt compelled to say who was calling even though he knew full well that she’d have seen his name on call display. “No, but I’m just finishing up where I am. Is there a problem?”

She took the USB drive she’d been after out of the safe, closed it again and stepped over the unconscious security guard to make her way to the window.

“Bucky’s back.”

Shooting a grapple up to the eaves of the roof, she put the phone in her pocket, slid down to the ground then took it out again. “You found him?”

“No, he found me.”

“Do you know why?”

Natasha saw a light go on in the room she’d just left and heard yelling. Darting into a doorway, she waited long enough for a head to appear in the window above. When it pulled back in, she ran to the car she had waiting and pulled out into the traffic of Nevpatoriya.

She put the phone on ‘speaker.’

“I do, but…Ok, I guess it’s all right if I tell you, since you work for Fury, sometimes. Nick located him a few months ago and gave him an open invite to come work for him.  Bucky took him up on it. I’m guessing that needing his arm fixed gave him a push.”

“Makes sense. He hasn’t been doing anything that Nick wouldn’t be happy to bankroll and Nick’s options are limited since S.H.I.E.L.D. has unravelled.”

Hearing nearby sirens, she took a sharp turn up an alley and abandoned the car. She was close enough to her extraction point to make it on foot.

“So why are you calling me, Steve?”

Natasha threw on a shabby coat, a headscarf and a pair of sunglasses, picked up a string bag full of produce up from the seat beside her and then exited the alley at a leisurely pace, holding the phone to her ear, now off speaker.

“I’m worried that Bucky…well, I’m not sure he sees winning and dying as opposites, if you know what I mean. Sam thinks he should talk to someone, but I have no idea who that would be. There’s no S.H.I.E.L.D. anymore and I don’t think Bucky would trust them anyway.”

A squad of four soldiers were approaching at a run. Natasha turned to a storefront display and examined some aging mackerel.

“Why can’t he talk to Sam? He’s easy to talk to and knows the history. He’s even worked with vets.”

“They got off on the wrong foot. Sam was upset that I invited Bucky to stay with me instead of locking him up or something. I don’t know why he was so worried. I told him it was fine.”

Natasha smiled. “I can’t imagine, Steve. I have to put you on hold for a moment.”

After ditching the disguise, Natasha approached her contact on the ramp of a small fishing vessel. Once they’d exchanged a series of passwords, he led her to the cargo hold, where she jumped down onto the catch of the day and wiggled her way down into the fishy corpses.

Taking her phone out again, she said, “Ok, I’m back. I take it you want me to talk to him and get a read on how he’s doing? Hand holding isn’t my forte, Steve.”

“Bucky doesn’t need his hand held. I just…I saw some of the stuff you put on the internet, Natasha. I wasn’t looking for it, but….”

Natasha’s hand tightened on the phone. “You saw enough to think that the Winter Soldier and I would have some things in common.”

“Yeah.”

There was a silence on the other end of the line, then Steve said, “Am I out of line?”

She forced a smile to her face, knowing that mimicking a feeling made it show in a voice. “It was my choice to put that out there, Steve.”

“That’s not what I’m asking.”

“I know.” Natasha pushed a sliding fish away from her face. “I can be back in about fourteen hours or so. I’ll talk to him.”

“Thanks, Natasha.” There was another pause before he said, “I know what I’m asking. This means a lot to me.

“Actually, you don’t, but you’re welcome.”

Ending the call, Natasha turned the phone off, put a straw in her mouth and finished burying herself in fish.

————————————————————————————-

“Look at this, Steve. This house is a few doors down from where my parents place was and it’s going for over 6 million.”

Bucky pointed to the computer screen and a picture of a brownstone that Steve remembered well from when they were kids.

He’d turned out to be surprisingly computer savvy. Initially surprising, that is. Once Steve had thought about it, he’d realized that the Winter Soldier would have used all the tools available to him and computers were a pretty important tool.

They hadn’t let him anywhere near the internet, of course, but he’d gotten a handle on that really quickly.

Bucky let out a quiet whistle and shook his head. “How do people afford that?”

“Most of them don’t, I guess.”

The song that Bucky had been playing on YouTube ended—recent jazz by someone Steve hadn’t heard of. He clicked on something else, seemingly at random, and the room filled with the most godawful noise Steve had ever heard, loud drums and guitar with guttural screaming over top. Just screaming, no singing at all.

Bucky stopped the video and looked at Steve. “What the hell was that? I don’t mean the band. I see the name of the band, but what the hell, Steve?”

“Don’t ask me, Buck. I don’t get it either.”

Bucky clicked on another tab and started a video he’d been watching earlier. It was much more melodic than the other, but still not to Steve’s taste.

He tapped the screen. “Look at those people dancing. They’re four feet apart. They aren’t even looking at each other.” Bucky gave Steve a grin. “I don’t much see the point in dancing with a pretty girl and being so hands off, do you?”

Steve pulled up a chair and sat down next to Bucky. “Sharon tells me there are clubs where people still listen to swing music and dance. No big bands around anymore, though. That kinda died after the war, I guess.”

Lifting an eyebrow, Bucky said, “Sharon?”

“Yeah. I don’t know her very well, but she seems nice and she was one of the agents who stood up to Hydra. Natasha wants me to ask her out, but….”

Steve had told Bucky that Peggy was still alive, but in fragile health and very, very old. Bucky had just nodded and put a hand on Steve’s shoulder.

He got it, how confusing it was to see her young and vital one day and so old practically the very next, according to his time, if not the world’s.  

In fact, Steve thought that was one of the reasons Bucky hadn’t wanted to go see her yet, although the reason he’d given was that ‘he didn’t want to see her until he was worth seeing’, which had pissed Steve off enough that he’d had to shut up about it. It was no good being angry when you tried to talk to someone about their crappy attitude.

When Peggy was lucid, there was still no one he’d rather talk to and every moment of the time they spent together reminded him of the person she’d been. He was still in love with 1940s Peggy and it was stupid and sad and he just couldn’t seem to shake it.

Dating someone else felt wrong, but it wasn’t like he could be with Peggy, either. Being out of the ice for three years hadn’t made that feeling go away, even if maybe it should have. It still hurt like hell. He didn’t have to explain that to Bucky.

“A date, huh?” Bucky glanced at him, His gaze meeting Steve’s then looked at the screen again. “You don’t have to get over stuff on someone else’s timetable, if it doesn’t feel right to you.”

“It’s not just that. I found out she’s Peggy’s niece. Or grand-niece. Something like that.”

Bucky’s eyebrows rose and he looked at Steve.

“Yeah, I know, Buck. That’s pretty weird.”

Bucky shook his head and went back to surfing the internet. “But you like her?”

“I dunno. Maybe.”

“Anyone else you like?”

“No, not really. Not like a date thing.”

“Then get to know her. You don’t have to take it any further than that—unless you think she’ll dump you if you don’t put out.”

“No, I—“Steve saw the smirk on Bucky’s face. “You jerk. This is serious. I don’t want to lead her on.”

“So talk to her. If she doesn’t get it, no big loss. If she does….” Bucky shrugged.

“Maybe. I’ll think about it.”

“You’re right though. It’s weird as hell.”

“Yeah.”

Steve scratched his forehead then said. “Um…speaking of Natasha…. She’s coming over tomorrow.”

Bucky’s hand stilled on the mouse for a moment. “Nice segue. You learn that from your spy buddies?”

“I don’t know what you mean.”

“Of course you don’t.” He turned the chair to look at Steve. “When?”

“Tomorrow night.”

“Why?”

“To visit.”

“Uh huh.” Bucky turned back to the screen and put on music that Steve really, really didn’t like.

He had a feeling it was on purpose. He just didn’t know why Bucky was so pissed off.

————————————————————————————-

“Steve, you got a place to work out?”

Bucky was feeling antsy and he wanted to work some of that off. He wasn’t used to staying in one place this long. That, put together with knowing there were people who knew where he was…. It was making him twitchy.

“We could go to the gym in the Avengers building, if you’re ok with that.”

“Not really, but I can manage. Would they be ok with it, though? Flyboy thinks I’m a time bomb.”

Steve’s eyebrows rose. “You heard that?”

Bucky smiled and shook his head. “No, I guessed because I’m not an idiot, but I know now.”

“Oh.” Steve tossed the towel on the back of a chair. “I’ll call and let them know we’re on the way. Cab or bus?”

“Do they have a range, too?”

“Yeah.”

“How big?”

“Really big.”

“Cab, then. I’ll be bringing the bag of guns.”

————————————————————————————-

Even though Steve had called ahead, Bucky was wary when they arrived at the Avengers tower, but a smiling receptionist let them in, no problem.

When they got off the elevator at the floor the gym was on, a male voice—British, like Farnsworth—said, “Good morning, Captain Rogers. It’s a pleasure to see you again.”

There wasn’t a soul to be seen.

Steve acted like this was totally normal, and said, “Thank you, Jarvis.”

“Sergeant Barnes, welcome to the tower. If there’s anything I can do for you please don’t hesitate to ask—and may I also say, welcome home, sir, welcome home.”

“Thanks…Jarvis. Thanks very much.” He gave Steve a questioning glance.

Leaning over, Steve whispered, “I’ll explain later.”

“No need to wait, Captain. I’m quite aware that I’m not human. No need to worry about offending.”

“I figured, Jarvis. I just didn’t want to be rude and discuss you like you weren’t there.”

“Your manners do you credit, sir, but please, feel free. I’m certain that Sergeant Barnes is rather curious.”

As they continued up the hall, Steve said, “Jarvis is a…computer that can think like people, sort of. Tony Stark made him. Jarvis’ personality is based on Edwin Jarvis, Howard Stark’s butler, who…uh….”

“Raised him after Howard and Maria Stark died in a suspicious accident. I know about that, Steve.”

“Oh….” Steve’s head bowed.

Bucky put a hand on Steve’s arm to stop him. “I don’t know. I don’t know if I did it. I know the details because I searched for everyone we knew on the internet. I remember most things, I think, but some stuff is still coming back and some of the missions I do remember are mixed up. I only knew what they told me, anyway. I don’t remember doing it, but I can’t be sure so…I don’t know. I’d tell you if I did. I damn well hope not.”

He hoped not to the point that he lay awake at night trying and trying to remember and it was eating a hole in his gut that never really went away, just like almost killing Steve did, but Steve didn’t need to know anything about that.

A big frown on his face, Steve said, “It wasn’t you, Bucky. If it wasn’t an accident, whatever happened, it was Hydra. Nothing they made you do is your fault.”

Bucky didn’t say anything. He didn’t have anything to say that Steve would want to hear. He just started walking again so Steve would, too. A minute later he followed Steve into the gym.

It was a huge room with ceiling to floor windows on the exterior wall. One side of the room held every kind of equipment that one could ever want, the other, a parkour course and thin gym mats for sparring. “This…is nice.”

Steve nodded. “Yeah. Big step up from that boxing club you used to go to, huh?

“I’d forgotten about that place. Roaches as big as my thumb. A roach wouldn’t dare show up here.”

They worked out for a couple hours then Steve suggested they spar for a while.

That sounded good. “Knives, gloves or barehanded?”

”Barehanded. We’d just wreck the gloves and I’m not much for knives.” Steve raised his voice. “Jarvis, if anyone looks like they’re coming to the gym, could you let them know that Bucky and I are sparring?”

“Certainly, Captain.”

Bucky gave Steve a look. “Not as sure about my reception as you said, huh? Don’t want them to see us fighting without warning?”

“You’re in the Avengers tower, Buck. That means you’re welcome here. I just wouldn’t want anyone to walk into the middle of it and get hurt.”

Sparring was good fun, fast and challenging. They both pulled their punches a little—he used his metal arm as little as possible and Steve didn’t bounce him off the walls. They focused more on speed and technique than strength and, in that, they were surprisingly evenly matched—at least the casual way they were going at it.

Bucky knew from experience that in a full on fight, Steve would be faster.

That was the other reason that sparring with Steve was good. It pushed that fight on the helicarrier a little further into the background and gave him a good memory to switch to when his brain wanted to show him a repetitive loop of him smashing his fist into Steve’s face after Steve had just plain stopped fighting.

When they’d been sparring for about forty minutes, Bucky caught a lucky break and was able to get Steve in a choke hold, which he quickly released. They picked themselves up, grinning, and mutually agreed to end it there.

Bucky tensed when he saw a man he didn’t recognize sitting at the side of the room holding a bowl, but Steve gave the guy a wave and led Bucky over to join him. He tried to look like he didn’t expect that to go wrong.

“Hi Clint. Bucky, this is Clint Barton, otherwise known as Hawkeye. Clint, this is Bucky—James Barnes.”

Clint adjusted the bowl and stuck out his hand. “Good to meet you.”

Bucky shook his hand, relaxing a bit. “You brought popcorn?”

“Damn right. Jarvis told me that Captain America and the ex-Winter Soldier were sparring in the gym and that’s definitely a popcorn worthy spectator sport.”

“Still the Winter Soldier, I guess. Just not the same one.”

“You’ve got the arm, might as well keep the title.” Clint held out the bowl. “Want some?”

“Sure, thanks.” Bucky took a handful.

Oh, God. It tasted awful. How do you ruin popcorn? Forcing himself to swallow, he said, “Is it supposed to taste like that?” He looked at Steve, who hadn’t taken any, the smug bastard.

Clint smiled. “That’s popcorn seasoning, old timer. Bacon cheddar. What, they didn’t have bacon in your day?”

Bucky shook his head. “That’s not bacon. There’s nothing bacon about that.”

“Your loss, my gain.” Clint took another handful. “What are you two up to now? Anything fun?”

Steve picked up his gym bag. “Bucky wanted to use the range for a bit.”

“Excellent! I foresee winning a lucrative bet or two. Let’s go.”

Bucky smiled. “I wouldn’t be too sure of that.”

“That’s what all the gunslingers say.”

“Gunslingers? What do you shoot, then?”

“A bow and arrow.”

A bow and arrow…. Bucky looked at Steve, whose smugness had increased dramatically. There was more to this than met the eye. “You’re on. I gotta see this.”

————————————————————————————-

Clint put his dinner plate in the sink and picked up his phone, glancing at the call display as he answered. “Hi, Natasha. Everything go okay?”

“Other than three hours in the hold of a fishing vessel followed by an uncomfortable flight on a cargo plane, yes—I have it.”

“That’s great. Glad to hear it. Hey, guess who I met yesterday with Steve?

“James Barnes, aka the Winter Soldier, aka ‘Bucky’?

“Spoilsport.” Clint opened the refrigerator and took out a soda. “How’d you know?”

“Steve called me. I’m going to visit tonight."

“Really?” Clint popped the cap and took a drink.

“You think it unlikely that I’d drop by to say hello?”

“I’ve met you, remember? You’re not the ‘welcome wagon’ type, especially when the welcome-ee shot you.”

“How did he seem?”

“Steve? Or Bucky?”

“James Barnes. I refuse to call a grown man ‘Bucky’.”

“Dunno. Either Sam was off the mark, or Steve’s pal has a mood swing problem. I didn’t see anything particularly angry or combative in him. No imminent ‘Oh my God, run for your fucking lives.’ He sparred with Steve without getting worked up and let go immediately when he pinned him. He swallowed bacon popcorn instead of spitting it out—and I know he thought it was gross. If that’s not the mark of a reasonably socialized individual, I don’t know what is. But then, I didn’t poke him with a stick, either. Doesn’t mean Sam was wrong.”

“From what you say, Sam told him that he was still the Winter Soldier, with or without programming. I’m not sure what Sam hoped to achieve. He gathered no new information and the reaction was predictable.”

“So what you’re saying is take Sam off the super-secret ‘recruit to be spies’ list because he has the spy instincts of a Muppet?”

“Goading the Winter Soldier to see if you can get him to react badly is probably the least tactically sound plan I’ve heard in a long time—and I hear all your plans.”

“Ow! I’m wounded.” Clint took another sip of soda. “Ok, not very. I’m secure in my genius” He put the can down. “Let me know what you think after you meet him. He’s damn good. We could use him if he’s up to it. If he’s not, we needed to know that, too, and figure out how to deal with him without making Rogers blow a vintage gasket.”

“Nick has already recruited him.”

“Steve tell you that?”

“Yes, but I already suspected. You don’t just walk through airport security with a metal arm, so either he was extracted or he used his old contacts to get back to the U.S.

“If he feels anything like I did, it’ll be a while before he feels secure enough in his freedom to do that. Besides, doesn’t that seem like something Nick would do? Recruit the Winter Soldier to work for him secretly as soon as he could get him onboard?”

“It really, really does.” Clint rubbed his forehead “If Fury thinks he’s stable enough, I guess we don’t have to worry about it.”

“Not necessarily. Nick will only be judging whether the Winter Soldier can be used without it blowing up in his face, and whether the benefits outweigh the costs, if it does. If all he wants to do is point the Winter Soldier at people he wants wiped from the map, it doesn’t matter how James Barnes is doing.”

Flopping down in an armchair, Clint said, “I’m not supposed to know about any of this, am I?”

“No, and neither am I, but since we work for Nick, too, I thought I’d share.”

“Yeah, it’s like comparing paychecks. You’re not supposed to do it, but it’s a good idea.”

Clint leaned back in the chair and ran a hand through his hair, sorting through options. “Call me tomorrow and let me know how it goes. Right now, he’s Steve’s problem and Steve can take care of himself. If Bucky’s going to become ours, I want to know how big a problem that is.”

————————————————————————————-

Bucky went for a walk alone at irregular intervals to look for tails and observers who might have picked up his trail. He didn’t want anything coming back to Steve.

He’d checked the area around Steve’s apartment for surveillance devices before contacting him and found a number that he thought had been installed by S.H.I.E.L.D. at some point in the past. He’d disabled those. If anyone was monitoring them now, it wasn’t S.H.I.E.L.D.

Of course, he would have disabled them, anyway, and he checked at and around those locations again whenever he had time, as well as in places he would have chosen to install more.

He’d done the same around his makeshift armory—an old and little known Hydra safe house. No electronic surveillance there, but that didn’t mean it was actually safe, just not high in Hydra’s search priority list. Those who’d known it existed might still be alive, but had no reason to think that he might be using it as a weapons depot and little reason use it themselves. It wasn’t in a functionally efficient location.

Still, there was a reason he needed Fury to find him a place to live and that he wasn’t staying there now. The sooner he moved his larger weapons out of there, the better, but moving rocket launchers and such to Steve’s would have been problematic and Fury was too deeply underground to hold onto his weapons for him.

So he walked, patrolling the places he needed to patrol.

Walking wasn’t just placing one foot in front of the other, it was ‘woman approaching on the right. She’s wearing a coat. Concealed weapons possible. Hands visible and engaged. Two men fifty yards away speaking to each other, not looking. Are they pointedly not looking? Is that a front? What language are they speaking? If they’re speaking about work, do their clothes match the work they’re claiming? Are their shoes too nice? Too worn?’

Walking was scanning each and every person of thing within sight and gauging threat. It was looking for things that weren’t in sight and pinpointing the best places for covert assassination. It was constant observation and analysis.

Bucky enjoyed it. It was impossible to do that and think about things he didn’t want to think about. It was normal. It was relaxing—or as close to it as he knew how to do.

It ceased to be relaxing when he spotted a tail near the safe house which was obviously now compromised.

They were good. Two men and a woman, changing who was behind him at intervals, the others moving into positions ahead of him to cover possible direction shifts on his part.

Without letting on that he’d seen them, he turned a corner and headed away from the most populated streets, toward a small industrial pocket that would be clearing of foot traffic as afternoon moved toward evening. A place where most people wouldn’t want to be walking the streets after dark, or even now.

He didn’t change pace or stop observing others on the route. This team had back up, people moving into position ahead of him. He needed to lead them to a place where he could tempt them into acting when he wanted them to and that he knew better than they did—someplace he’d mapped out ahead of time for just this scenario.

The fact that he’d preplanned didn’t make his pulse race any the less. He couldn’t know how many people they had lurking in the shadows or preplaced. He could only plan for what was likely, not what anger over his activities against Hydra might have conjured in an imaginative brain. He couldn’t know if they’d act before he got them to where he wanted them.

Bucky clamped down on the part of his mind that feared capture, that was intensely aware of every mistake he’d ever made, every action that he should now regret. That inner voice took control as he slept, but now, awake, he could silence it. Right now, he had to silence it, or it would get him killed.

He turned down a dead end alley and they moved to block his exit. So far, so good. Glancing up, he saw movement on a rooftop above, a rifle barrel. He looked at the opposite rooftop. Nothing yet….

Jumping onto a dumpster that he’d moved a few feet from its original position days earlier. Its new position made it possible for him to grab the ladder of a fire escape to the two story roof. Climbing quickly, as bullets took chips out of bricks in the wall he faced, Bucky cartwheeled off the top of it into the sniper who was gaping at him, caught off guard and not expecting a close quarters fight.

The rifle dropped as the woman sprawled out on the tar and gravel rooftop. Bucky picked it up and brought the butt down on her head, not hard enough to crush her skull, but hard enough to take her out of the action. 

He looked at the rooftop on the other side of the alley and saw a second sniper who’d been slower to get into position.

Rolling forward into a kneeling position and evading a shot from the second sniper, he aimed. It took an effort of will to move the sight from an easy headshot to the man’s shoulder. Bucky fired and the man went down.

He wanted desperately to kill this team—an enemy left alive and free was an enemy who’d come back better prepared—and trying to turn them over to anyone would reveal his presence when they talked. He knew what would happen if the government got ahold of him and it wouldn’t be a welcome home parade.

He couldn’t let himself kill them, though. Bodies would mean other questions, a manhunt, maybe a trail back to Steve. He’d known that would be the case, but not killing these Hydra bastards was harder than he’d thought it would be. A lot harder….

Bucky put the sniper rifle down and pulled off his coat and cap, revealing his battle gear beneath. He took the glove off his metal hand, grabbing the two Sig Sauer handguns holstered at his hips.

The door to the rooftop burst open and four men ran out to block any exit by stairs, raising automatic weapons.  

One, two, three down, kneecaps shattered into nonexistence. He ran forward to grab the fourth man’s arm and break his wrist as he twisted the weapon from his grasp.

Bucky grabbed him by the throat and lifted him off the ground, pulling him forward, his metal arm whirring. Nose to nose, he said, “You’re a lucky man, pal. I’m going to let you live.”

Straightening his arm, he threw the Hydra operative forward into the wall of the rooftop access. The man's head snapped backwards into the cinderblocks and he slid to the ground, unconscious.

One of the kneecapped agents was just moaning, tears of pain running down his face and another had passed out, so Bucky holstered his guns and  gave the moaning man a kick in the head. He turned his attention to the one third, who was scrabbling to pick up the weapon he’d dropped when he was shot.

Bucky stomped down on the reaching hand, fingers breaking beneath his heel, then picked him up and tossed him across the rooftop. The operative screamed as his shattered knee hit the ground.

Picking up the automatic rifle the man had been trying to get, Bucky dropped it and the others next to the sniper rifle and walked over to the man, whose screams had turned to whimpering.

He raised his metal arm and punched once—still conscious—twice—that did the trick—three times—just because he wanted to and because he was having a hell of a time not killing them.

Bucky attached a discreet tracker to a pocket inside the lining of the man’s coat and then did the same with the female sniper. She was starting to stir, so he hit her again.

Pulling out his Sigs, Bucky jumped off the roof onto the dumpster, firing at the three still blocking his exit from the alley as he landed.

He wasn’t trying to hit them, and he didn’t. It would have been too easy to kill them inadvertently. It was hard to aim precisely when your knees were bending to absorb impact. He just wanted them more concerned about their survival than what he was going to do next.

Putting one handgun in a holster, he put his metal hand on the top of the dumpster and pushed off, vaulting toward the closest man feet first and knocking him into the other two.

After removing three more knees from the equation–and evading a very narrow miss that would have killed instantly, he collected their guns.

Bucky climbed back up to the roof, put his coat, hat and glove back on, stowed the collected weapons in a bag that one of the Hydra men had been carrying his automatic rifle in, and made his way down the stairs and out onto the street.

He was far enough away when he heard sirens that he hoped the Hydra operatives had been able to hide themselves. That would be cleanest. If not, he knew they wouldn’t admit to being Hydra, which helped him, too.

He encountered no problems getting back to Steve’s. The only thing he had trouble with was his regret at leaving the assassination squad alive to report in or come after him again.

That, and losing his heavy weapons. He was going to have to write off the Hydra safe house and the weapons inside. Even the small chance that he might lead them back to Steve’s apartment was too great a risk to take.

————————————————————————————-

When Steve got back to the apartment, a bag of groceries in one hand, it was obvious that something had happened. For one thing, there was a new bag of guns lying open on the table, a bloody rag on top. For another, Bucky was wearing his Winter Soldier gear and was armed to the teeth.

Bucky was also sitting still and doing nothing. That didn’t sound bad, but Steve had noticed that Bucky never sat still and did nothing. He read, cleaned his guns, surfed the internet, did push-ups—anything to keep from sitting still–which made sense. Up until Bucky broke his programming, the only time he’d been awake in seventy years was when he had something to do.

Steve also knew full well that doing nothing usually led to thinking about things you’d rather not think about. He’d had that problem after they’d thawed him out and that was one of the reasons he’d gotten in the habit of going running as often as he did.

There was something about the way Bucky was sitting—bolt upright, one hand resting on his leg, the other on the table in a way that wasn’t relaxed at all, his face completely impassive but totally aware. It reminded Steve of the way Bucky had looked before they started fighting on the helecarrier, still and watchful, waiting and not giving anything away.

Steve dropped the bag by the door. “What happened? Are you ok?”

“Hydra found my weapons stash. I had to abandon it.”

“Are you ok, Bucky?”

“It’s not my blood. I didn’t kill them.” Bucky didn’t say anything for too long before he turned his head to look at Steve. “That was a lot harder to do that than I thought it was going to be.”

Looking forward again, his face still blank, Bucky said, “Flyboy might have been right about me.”

“He’s not, Buck. I know you and I know why you had to go after Hydra. I’d have done the same.”

“Maybe, but you wouldn’t have left the same body count, would you, Steve? You wouldn’t have had trouble leaving them alive.” 

There was another long pause before Bucky said, “I have to tell you something. I didn’t know who I was anymore after you rescued the 107th. Sometimes…I resented that. I don’t now. I just want you to know that.”

Steve felt like he’d been punched in the gut. “You…resented me, Bucky? Why?”

He still wasn’t looking at Steve. “Not you. I resented what Zola did to me and how afraid of it I was. I resented that I couldn’t control how angry I was afterward. I resented that I didn’t stop being angry or afraid of what I might turn into, no matter how hard I tried not to be. I resented that I could see just how far away from being anything like Captain America I was. Most of all, I resented not being the Bucky Barnes you thought I was anymore.”

“Bucky, you’re—“

“Shut up, Steve. I don’t want to talk about it. I just needed you to know. The world got the Captain America it deserved and you got everything I could have hoped you’d get, because you deserved it, too.”

Steve would have been a lot less worried if Bucky had seemed upset or angry as he said these things—or even looked at him—but he didn’t. An idea was scratching at Steve’s brain that made him feel sick.

“Bucky…are you saying you think you deserved what happened to you?”

There was a long silence before Bucky said, “I’m saying that they couldn’t have made me into the Winter Soldier if the pieces weren’t already there to begin with.”

The sick feeling turned into something close to panic because Steve had no idea what to say that would make Bucky feel differently. That sounded a lot like Bucky wasn’t just blaming himself for the things he’d done, but for becoming the Winter Soldier in the first place. That was so damn wrong.

Jesus effin’ Christ. How could he think that? What the hell was going on in his head?

Bucky glanced at the clock and Steve realized that this was some weird prelude to Natasha’s imminent arrival. He had no idea what that meant, but it was the least thing on his mind.

“Bucky, you listen to me, damn it. I don’t think you’re less than you were, I think you’re more. You’re a survivor and a fighter and you never give up. I’m not ashamed of what you did, I’m proud—really proud–that you survived it. I’m proud that you picked yourself up after everything they did to you and went out there to take the battle back to Hydra. You never surrender, Buck. The only way they could keep you the Winter Soldier was to keep you in cryostasis and erase who you are again and again, because you never stopped fighting. And I’m NEVER going to stop reminding you of it, so you might as well get it through your damn thick head right now!”

Steve was very close to doing something stupid, like punching a wall. He couldn’t remember the last time he was this angry—at Bucky, at himself, at everything. He had to get out until he calmed down.

Grabbing his coat, he said, “I’m…. I need to walk around the block a few times. I’ll be back soon. I’ll tell Natasha to let herself in, so don’t be surprised.”

Bucky still didn’t move or look at him, which made Steve even angrier.

When he got down to the street, he called Natasha, walking fast as he did. “Natasha, let yourself in when you get here. You still have keys, right?”

“I do. Is everything alright, Steve? Did something happen?”

“Yes…sort of. It just makes me so damn mad that Bucky’s so hard on himself. I don’t know what to do about it, and that makes me even madder. I needed to leave before I said or did something that made things worse. He says he’s not the man I think he is, but he is, damn it! Why does he keep blaming himself instead of the people who did it to him? Why?”

“Steve, I’m on my way. I’ll talk to him. Stay gone for a while. Find something to hit, go for a run–get it out of your system, somehow. It doesn’t help him for you to be tied up in knots.”

Steve dragged his fingers through his hair and took a deep breath. “Ok. Yeah, ok. Just…help him, Natasha. I don’t know how.”

“I’ll try, Steve.”

————————————————————————————-

Natasha knocked and opened the door to Steve’s apartment. James Barnes was sitting at the table looking far more like the Winter Soldier that the man Clint described, wearing battle armor, guns, knives, and with assorted damage from combat marking his face and neck, but she recognized the look in his eyes when he turned his head, his gaze meeting hers.

He was sinking and he didn’t know how to get out.

She’d seen shades of that look in the mirror, the difference being that he’d been a grown man when they’d made him into someone he’d have hated being, whereas she’d been a child, without an adult’s sense of self and self-betrayal.

“Hello, James. Do you remember me? Natasha.”

“Yes.” There was a long pause before he said, “Do you remember me?”

His voice was hesitant, at odds with his stance, but his expression was so resolutely blank that she couldn’t determine why. In the absence of knowledge, she went with the only reason she could think of.

“From Odessa?” Natasha didn’t approach, not yet. He’d had his personal space disregarded for decades and she wanted to show that she respected it. “Yes. I don’t blame you for it, if that concerns you. If anything, I wonder why you didn’t kill me. I know you could have. You had a clear shot, but you didn’t take it until I turned to see where you were and you could shoot through my side, instead of my back. Once I saw your location, I knew that. I always wondered…why?”

Again, a strange pause….

“I didn’t know. I just knew that I didn’t want to kill you, but…I guess I forgot by the time I fought you on the highway. I remember now.”

“Did you know what Black Widows were? Back in Odessa?”

A corner of his mouth curved, ever so slightly. “Yes.”

“That makes it even more peculiar that you let me live. Do you remember why?”

James pulled his gaze from hers. “Why are you here, Natasha? You don’t know me, so why come by?”

“Steve is worried about you. He asked me to visit, but that’s not really why I wanted to talk to you.”

His eyes turned to her again. “No?”

Natasha walked past him to the refrigerator and opened the freezer, taking out the bottle of vodka that Steve kept there for her. She grabbed two small glasses from the cupboard and went back to the table to sit across from James. She put the glasses and the bottle between them.

“Because I may be the only one who knows what it feels like to have your mind tampered with. To have not only your memories removed and altered, but your entire identity and sense of self. To wake up one day and realizes that they made you into someone you don’t want to recognize, but do, and to remember all the things that you did while you were that person.”

She knew that giving him alcohol might not be wise, but she also knew that the way he was sitting—seemingly at ease, but ready to fight–the wary watchfulness, the unreadable expression—it was armor, the only way he’d had to protect himself when he was the Winter Soldier.

Now, it was a way to remove himself from James Barnes and what James Barnes was feeling. She also knew that it wouldn’t work, but that as long as he was trying to close himself off, she wouldn’t be able to get through to him.

She needed to get him to put aside that armor, even if he only dropped it enough to pick up a glass and drink, because that was human and it was a step.

Natasha poured them each a shot then picked up her glass, waiting for him to do the same.

James watched her for a moment, shifted slightly in his seat and then picked up his glass, saying, “ваше здоровье.”

 “спасиб, James. To your health, also.”

They drank and Natasha topped up the glasses again.

“You look like you’re ready for a fight. Does Hydra know you’re here?”

“No. I’d be waiting outside to lead them away, if they did. They found me somewhere else.”

“How did they find you?”

“I had my heavy weapons stored at an old Hydra safe house. As far as I know, it wasn’t one they’d used in decades. Access was too problematic. They must have found out I was in the city and started checking each and every one. I noticed a tail when I was on my way there.”

Natasha glanced at the bloody rag on top of the open bag of weapons. “You resolved the problem.” It wasn’t a question. He wouldn’t be here if he hadn’t. If the blood was his, Steve wouldn’t have left the apartment. It was more likely that he’d been cleaning his gear.

“They’re alive, but in no condition to continue and if they’d known about this place, I would have seen signs of it.”

“James, we care about Steve and we know how much you mean to him, but we also care about your well-being apart from how it affects Steve. Clint was very impressed with you.”

“Clint’s a good guy. Doubt he cares that much through, and I’m pretty sure Flyboy just wants me locked up.”

“Sam? He’s lost someone he cared about like a brother and he doesn’t want that to happen again. He’s also never lost himself and had to figure out who he was on the other side of it. Clint and I both have.”

James’ eyes narrowed. “And that’s why this matters to you? Even though you don’t know me except as the guy whose best quality was shooting you through the side when he could have shot you in the back?”

“Why would I have to have known you to care now? You focus too much on the past, James.”

“Maybe I do, but you know what they say about history.”

“Where did you learn Russian?”

He was staring at his glass, not looking at her when he answered, “Hydra found the Soviet Union to be fertile ground.”

He was evading, but she let it be.

James’ gaze returned to her. “How did you come to leave Department X?”

So…he knew about Department X as well as Black Widows. That was interesting, since she’d known nothing about him except as an unbelievable story. “Nick Fury sent Clint to kill me. I was damaging S.H.I.E.L.D. operations. Clint disobeyed his orders at great risk to himself and recommended that I be recruited, instead. I ended up defecting a short time later.”

“And they trusted you? Even with what you’ done before?”

“Not at first. I had to prove myself. What Sam said to you wasn’t very different  than what I heard.”

“Except the part about being an unhinged killer who might murder his best friend.”

Natasha shrugged lightly. “Like I said, not very different. You think there weren’t people who thought I was playing Clint? It wasn’t an unreasonable assumption, after all, and Sam had valid concerns.”

“You agree with him? That I shouldn’t be hunting down Hydra?”

“I think you should burn them to the ground and scatter their bones, but I don’t think you should do it alone. You don’t have to do that anymore.”

“I know what I’m doing breaks all kinds of laws, even if it has to be done. Law isn’t geared for removing a threat like Hydra. This isn’t something I can ask Steve to help with.”

“No, but I could.”

He lifted an eyebrow. “Why would you?

“Oh, I don’t know…maybe because they made S.H.I.E.L.D. into something just as bad as what I left? Maybe because they made me destroy my life?”

“I’m still not seeing a reason to help me.”

Natasha found that she didn’t have an answer for that, not one that he’d believe, so she shrugged and gave him the real one. “I don’t know why. I just think I might like to.”

She expected him to scoff or show distrust of her motives, but he didn’t. He just gave her the slightest of smiles and said, “Ok.”

He watched her for a moment, that little smile still on his face, and then said, “I know enough about Department X to know why you’d want to leave when you had the opportunity, but you’re Russian. Was it hard to leave? You must have had friends there. Maybe…someone you cared about?”

Natasha shook her head. “They used up my loyalty long before and a spy is a danger to friends and lovers.”

James lifted his glass. “Я пью за разоренный дом, За злую жизнь мою, За одиночество вдвоем, И за тебя я пью,” (I drink to our ruined house, to all of life’s evils too, to our mutual loneliness, and I, I drink to you.)

 Her eyebrows rose. Russian poetry. How very unexpected. “What is that, James?”

“Part of a poem by Anna Akhmatova. It’s called ‘The Last Toast.’ There’s more, but it didn’t apply.”

 “Oh, I know her. I want to hear the whole thing.”

 He gave her a half smile. “Ok, but only if you promise not to think I was implying the rest of it.

"Я пью за разоренный дом,

За злую жизнь мою,

За одиночество вдвоем,

И за тебя я пью,—

За ложь меня предавших губ,

За мертвый холод глаз,

За то, что мир жесток и груб,

За то, что Бог не спас."

(I drink to our ruined house,

to all of life’s evils too,

to our mutual loneliness,

and I, I drink to you –

to eyes, dead and cold,

to lips, lying and treacherous,

to the age, coarse, and cruel,

to the fact no god has saved us.)

Natasha smiled at James. She tilted her head and looked at him curiously. “How did you remember it after all the times they wiped your mind?”

“I didn’t. There were a few months where they didn’t put me in cryostasis. I was in Russia then. I had some books that I managed to pick up. I didn’t let them know. I remembered the cover of that one when my memories started to come back and I was able to find it at a rare bookstore. Cost a damn fortune.”

She laughed, genuinely amused. “Oh, James. It is very telling that you managed to collect dissident literature while under the thumb of Hydra and in Soviet Russia. That book alone screamed rebellion. Her work was condemned for most of her life.”

She looked at him, a smile still on her face. “It’s the perfect toast for spies and assassins, isn’t it?”

He smiled back and nodded, watching as she filled the small glasses again.

His smile faltered. “Do…they eat away at you? The things you did?”

James kept his eyes on the glasses, only glancing at her briefly. He knew that what he was asking was difficult, but that didn’t stop him from asking.

They were moving into things Natasha would rather not have discussed, but if she wanted him to open up, she had to create an environment where that felt safe. Refusing to do the same would tell him to hold back, too.

“Eat away at me, no, because I won’t let them, but there are things I regret deeply.” She smiled thinly, knowing that it probably looked more bitter than not. She found she didn’t care to hide that from him. “They’re all over the internet now, if you’re curious and want to have a look.”

James shook his head, his gaze lifting to meet hers. “I’m not going to do that.”

“Why not? Everyone else has.”

“Because you’d rather I not.” He looked away. “The only thing I need to know is how you live with it.”

Natasha knew he didn’t mean that as a slap in the face, but as a question he desperately needed answered. It still stung. She also knew such things were personal and what worked for her might not work for him, but she told him anyway.

“I try to balance the scales, erase some of the red from my ledger. I don’t focus on what I did, but on what I can do now. I can’t change the past, but each time I move the scales the other direction…I let myself to take pleasure in it rather than telling myself that it’s not enough.”

James’ brow furrowed and he looked at her again “I’m not sure can do that but…yeah…I understand. I didn’t just go after Hydra for revenge, I went after them to make sure that they could never do what they did to me to anyone else—every single damn one of them. It felt right. It felt…good. Not good to do it,… It felt that, too, but it felt right, good.”

“Is that why you got so angry with Sam? He took away your victory and made you feel like you couldn’t tell good from bad anymore?”

James’ lips curved into a smile that looked as bitter as hers had felt. “You know about that, huh? Damn, you Avengers are like housewives gossiping over the backyard fence. Say somethin’ to one of you, say it to all. I woulda liked to make my own first impression.”

That bitter smile didn’t go with what he’d said, at all. James was a complicated man.

His gaze drifted from hers. “Guess I wasn’t doing such a bang up job of that anyway. You must think I’m a real sad sack.”

“No, I think you’re a good man who doesn’t know how to be a good man after doing bad things.”

“Nah, Steve’s the good man, not me. I don’t even come close.”

He lifted his glass and when Natasha raised hers, said, “Вечная Память”

“Вечная Память” A toast to the dead. Let them be remembered forever. It was the traditional third toast, a toast to those who gave their lives in war, but it may also have been James getting another dig in at himself. It was entirely possible it was both.

“There’s a large amount of space between bad and ridiculously good, James.”

He gave a slight shrug and didn’t answer, all expression leaving his face again.

“James, something is tearing you up and it’s not being controlled by Hydra or having your mind wiped.” She reached out to put her hand on his. “You know I’ll understand, that there’s nothing you can say that will shock me.”

He looked immensely sad when he said, “Yeah. I do.” He looked down at her hand and touched it lightly with his metal one before pulling both hands away. “That doesn’t mean I want to talk about it. Or that I want you to hear it.

“Do you like to dance?” James filled their glasses again.

He really didn’t want to talk about whatever it was that’d had him hiding in himself when she’d arrived. She was going to have to find out what that was, or getting him to unbend enough to converse with her would do no good in the long run.

Natasha smiled, letting him divert the conversation for the moment. “Yes. Do you?”

“I used to. I’d be kinda out of place on the dance floor these days. Besides, I’ve seen what’s called dancing now. It doesn’t look like much fun, really.”

“It can be. It depends on the partner.

“I guess I can see that.” He picked up his glass. “Did you ever learn ballet, Natasha?

“Ballet? No, I had no time for such things. I was very young when they started training me to be a Black Widow. Why?”

As she spoke, James’ eyes widened just enough for her to pick up something like surprise. He’d expected a different answer.

“Why did you think I had?”

“The way you move—graceful…controlled…expressive…. You’d be a good dancer.”

“How does a boy from 1940s Brooklyn know so much about ballet?”

“I once had a friend who danced.”

James raised his glass. “к прекрасной даме” (to a lovely lady)

Natasha smiled. “Me or your friend?”

“Both.” A slow smile spread across his face.

“Thank you, James.”

They drank.

She decided to push a little harder. With James, she thought the best way to do that would be to give something big to get something big. In his own way, he was almost as mannerly as Steve and might feel compelled to respond in kind. Perhaps she could use that.

As she refilled the glasses, she said, “Sometimes, I worry that I’ve lost something important. That in all the times they remade my memories for a job, they may have removed something integral. Something that was mine and that I should have been able to hold onto, somehow. It’s hard to know just how much ‘me’ is left.”

James’ hand froze as he reached for his glass and there was a kind of raw emotion in his eyes that he then reined in as he moved again and picked up the drink. His mouth opened as though he was doing to say something, but then closed as did his expression. He turned away from her gaze.

That got a reaction. Natasha continued, “Honestly? I don’t know. I am who I am. It’s hard to know if I’d like to know something without knowing what those things are.” She picked up her glass. “I also wonder if it really matters or if our characters don’t lead us to the same places, just by a different path. Are these things that you wonder about, James?”

“No.”

An uncharacteristically abrupt answer.

“No? Why is that?”

“I don’t want to talk about this, Natasha.”

“Why not?”

He didn’t answer, but downed his glass and poured himself another.

She pulled her chair close to his and put her hand on his shoulder. “James, tell me. Why not?”

“Damn it, Natasha…why won’t you just—”

She lifted her hand to touch his cheek. “Tell me.” Natasha let her hand drop, but stayed close.

There was a long silence as he stared into his glass before saying, “Because the only thing I worry about is that there was too much ‘me’ in the Winter Soldier.”

“How could that be? You had no memory of who you were.”

He looked at her. “I wasn’t…a puppet. Now that I have most of my memories again—or think I do—I know there were periods where I knew something was wrong and fought them, or argued with them about tactics but most of the time….

James frowned and dropped his gaze to the table. “Most of the time…I…enjoyed it. I thought I was doing something important. I was strong. Fast. Better than everyone around me. That…pleased me. I didn’t like the things they did to me, but I thought they had good reasons. I didn’t know I was a joke and a dupe….

He took a deep breath and let it out, like he was steeling himself. “When I went out on missions, I had complete control once I was in the field. I planned the methods. If there were back up teams, I gave the orders. It was all me. When people died, it was because I made it happen.”

James closed his eyes and rubbed his forehead. “What Steve doesn’t get is that they didn’t make the Winter Soldier, they just took out the parts that got in the way. They didn’t program me to be a different person, they just gave me memories to make me loyal and…willing to go as far as they wanted me to.”

“Most of the time, it was professional. I took pleasure at a well planned and executed mission. Sometimes though…things went wrong, they fought back harder than anticipated, made it difficult or forced me to waste my resources…. Sometimes…I lost my temper. They didn’t program me to do it. That was me, too. I killed people I didn’t have to. Sometimes….” He took a breath. “Sometimes…I really liked killing my targets.”

James grabbed his glass and gulped own the vodka. His face was twisting with emotion he was trying to control.

“I enjoyed the hell out of shooting Steve in the gut. After all the trouble he’d given me, it was so damn satisfying. I was happy. Happy that I…I shot Steve. I wanted him to die. And then later, when the helecarriers were coming down and he didn’t have a job to do anymore, Steve just…stopped fighting and let me hit him—again and again and again. He was trying to get me to remember but…it made me so mad and I just kept hitting him. I just wanted him to shut up, shut up and stop because if he was telling the truth…if everything was a lie….”

James covered his face with his hand to hide the tears that filled his eyes and choked back a sob with an effort of will that reminded her that his last time in anything like normal society was 1944 and, with the exception of the last week, all his waking time since then had been in a situations where showing personal feelings in front of others would have been unacceptable.

Natasha put her arms around him. “Let yourself grieve. You don’t have to sort it out. It’s complicated. Let it be. That’s ok.”

“It’s not…it’s not.”

She thought he might pull away, but he didn’t. He wrapped his arms around her, taking a deep, shuddering breath, and held her tight like she was the lifeline that was keeping him from going under—and at that moment, perhaps she was. It seemed likely that he hadn’t shared a single real feeling with anyone since recovering his memories over a year ago.

After a few minutes, he let go and sat up, dragging a hand across his eyes. “Sorry, I…. Sorry.”

Natasha reached up to touch his chin. “Stop that. There’s no need to be sorry, James.” She smiled at him. “Look, you told me and I don’t think any the less of you.”

“You should.”

She put her hands on his shoulders. “All it proves it that you’re always impressive, James. Without any of your history and the knowledge you gain from it, you were a force to be reckoned with. Of course you wanted to win and do the best for those who had your loyalty. It’s in your nature. It’s not your fault it was false.”

He started to pull away, but she wouldn’t let him. “Let yourself be human, James. Humans get angry. They make mistakes. No one would want to find out that they’d been used and betrayed, that they’d fought for the enemy and that their life was a lie. No one.”

James’ head dropped forward and he close his eyes, letting out a sigh. “It’s hard to…forgive.”

“I know. Believe me, I do.”

He looked at her, his lips tight, but one corner of his mouth curling up just a little, and then said. “I lied before. You’re not the only one who wonders what was done to them. During the war, I was captured by Hydra. They captured most of our unit, those who weren’t killed outright. Steve got us out of there, but not before I was Zola’s prize experiment for way too long.

Natasha repressed an internal shudder, the alcohol loosening her control and making it difficult to avoid imagining just what horrors that might have entailed.

“There was no way I should have survived that fall from the train. It was at least a mile down, maybe more, and I was lying in the snow with my arm ripped off for longer than I should have survived, even if the cold slowed the bleeding. I have to wonder why I lived and what else they might have done.”

She frowned, never having imagined that he’d been awake after his fall and had known what was happening to him. What else hadn’t been noted in the file she’d recovered?

He took her hand, staring down at her fingers. “The thing is, Natasha, you don’t have to worry about what they did to you or what they took, because you’re still amazing, and always were. I don’t have to know what they took from you to know that.”

The smile he gave her then was wicked, flirtatious, and he held her hand for a moment longer before letting it go.

Something in him had relaxed. He was no longer like a wire pulled tight and ready to snap, although she didn’t fool herself into thinking that his issues had miraculously vanished. Natasha was also surprised by how glad to see it and she smiled at him in return.

She filled the glasses again and picked up her glass. “Будьте добры к себе, Джеймс.  Если вы не можете сделать это для вас, то сделать это для меня.”

James laughed—a real laugh, if not a hearty one. “Ya got me. I can’t say no to you. I’ll try. You want me to be kind to myself, I’ll try.” He tossed back the vodka and gave her a smile. “But only because it’s for you.”

Natasha smiled at him. “That’s a start.” She drained the glass then pushed it away somewhat awkwardly.

That was enough of that. More than enough. She couldn’t believe she’d let herself get so far from fighting edge with such an unknown quantity as James Barnes and yet, she felt utterly unconcerned about it, which was most unlike her.

She heard a light tap on the door, followed by Steve’s voice. “I’m back.”

As he came into the room, his gaze took in the bottle, the glasses, and the smile on James’s face. He grinned at the two of them. “It’s times like this that I wish alcohol worked on me, darn it. It’s no fun being the teetotaler at the party.”

The way James grinned back at Steve told Natasha that he was feeling the vodka as much as she was, although she hadn’t noticed it in his movements. Perhaps that was why he’d spoken to her as freely as he had, given how difficult it had been for him and how closely he’d guarded those feelings.

“Hi Steve. Sorry I was such an ass earlier. I didn’t mean to worry you. I didn’t mean any of it, ok?”

Steve walked over to the table and gave James a light punch in the arm. “Sure you did and that’s ok. You don’t have to keep stuff under wraps like that, ya bum. We’re good, whatever you say or do.”

“Likewise. Thing is, you’ll never do anything crappy enough to put me to the test.”

Natasha stood. “I’ll be going now. It was nice to meet you, James.”

Steve gave her a smile that spoke volumes. “You sure you don’t want coffee?

“No, I’m still feeling a little jetlagged so I’m going to flag a cab.” And she needed to give them space to talk.

James was looking at her as though he wanted to say something but either couldn’t find the words or didn’t want to say them in front of Steve.

“Pick me up on Friday at eight, James. I’m going to let you take me to dinner. Unless you have other plans?

James smiled. “No, Ma’am, and If I did, I’d change ‘em.”

————————————————————————————-

 Clint put down the bow he was repairing and picked up the phone. “Hi Nat. What’s the verdict?”

“Sam wasn’t entirely wrong, but he wasn’t right, either. James Barnes is of great danger to Hydra and possibly himself to a lesser degree, but to no one else, in my opinion.”

“What kind of ‘lesser degree’?” Clint rubbed his chin. “Do you think he might try to kill himself?”

“No, he wouldn’t give his enemies the satisfaction, or do that to Steve, even If he wanted to. I’m certain he doesn’t. He’s trying to find a way to live with the things he’s done, not escape them. I think he might get himself killed trying to prove that he’s worthy of the faith Steve has in him, though.”

“Hmm. The impossible odds, no back up thing? What’re you thinking?”

“I’m thinking I’m going to watch his back and make sure that doesn’t happen. He deserves better after all he’s been through and I’m best equipped to help him.”

Clint frowned. “That’s a pretty thin branch you’d be crawling out on. You sure you want to do that?”

“Yes. His enemies are my enemies. Hydra compromised everything I thought I was doing.”

“We didn’t do anything that put red in your ledger again, Natasha.”

“We can’t know that. We can only hope that’s not the case.”

“I think you’re wrong about that, but it’s your call. Let me know if things go south.” He stood and picked up the bow again. “You have a new cover ready for this?”

“Yes. More than one, but talk to Fury, anyway. I think it might not be good for James to do too many missions in a row that feel personal, even if Nick brought him in to deal with Hydra.”

“I’ll talk to him—and tell Barnes not to be a stranger. He owes me a rematch. Shooting my arrow in half was not a valid way to win a bet.”

“I will. Oh, by the way…. We might want to consider using James for interrogations. He was questioning me fairly discreetly while we spoke and was surprisingly good at it. I have a feeling that was part of what he did for the Howling Commandos. We could make use of those skills.”

Clint’s eyebrows rose. “What questions was he asking that you were ok with answering?”

“Why I left Department X and if I left a lover behind there, if I liked to dance, with variations on the theme. That sort of thing.”

“So…Winter-Bucky uses interrogation to hit on the ladies, huh? Smooth….” Clint laughed.

“It wasn’t like that. He was trying to find out something else, I just don’t know what it was. Heis a flirt, though.”

Clint grinned. “Hey, Nat, this watching his back…. It wouldn’t have anything to do with you having a weakness for good looking, messed up guys, would it?”

There was a slight pause before she answered. He could hear a smile in her voice. “You forget where I came from, Clint. You were the picture of stability by comparison.”

“Aww, that’s sweet. You think I’m stable.”

“Good night, Clint.”

“Night, Natasha.”

Clint was still smiling as ended the call and went to get his tool kit. He had a feeling that having Bucky Barnes around was going get interesting.

————————————————————————————-

To be continued....