Archive of Our Own ^beta

When the Soldier breaks programming after D.C. there is a lot of confusion. Being cryogenically frozen for the better part of a few decades does not a healthy mind make, and the Soldier knows it. There are gaps. From before, when there was no Soldier, the gaps are larger. The museum fills in a couple, but there are more. Too many. The one bright spot, one clear picture he has from Before, is Steve.

But the Soldier--no, Bucky? No… not yet. Barnes--also knows that he can’t go to Steve. Not yet. There’s still too much to do, too much to… put back into place. If he goes now… he’d revert. He feels it in his bones. It’s too soon. A part of him, the Soldier, still whispers in his head that he has orders, a mission to complete, and he needs to destroy that voice before he can even consider returning to Steve.

So he gets to work.

It becomes obvious rather quickly that Steve and the other one, the Falcon, are looking for him. They arrive days or minutes after he’s departed and he moves faster. It’s still not safe, he’s still not safe. Barnes knows that he will never be safe to be around, not completely. He’s a killer, a trained assassin, and it is all he’s known for nearly a century. He holds onto a hope that Steve will help, will make him safer, but Barnes also knows that hope is dangerous. It’s why he hunts; to eliminate as much of Hydra, to purge as much of the Soldier, as he can.

Months flow into one another, and it is the longest he’s been awake since Before. It helps. Simply being awake, not returning to the chair and to cryo, fills in some of the gaps that have plagued his mind. He remembers more of his life with Steve. Tiny, sickly, idiotically brave Steve from before the serum, and Barnes takes a night off from the hunt to sift through and watch these new/old memories like a movie in his mind.

One particular memory catches his focus. The night he sees Steve’s Words for the first time. What they say is still fuzzy, out of focus, in his damaged mind, but what they are is clear. His Words; the first words his soulmate would say to him, letting him know--letting them both know--that this person was who you were meant to find. Barnes had forgotten all about Words in his time as the Soldier, but slowly the knowledge returns. Soulmates weren’t guarantees. Not everyone had one, though most did; some people had more than one. The Words could appear anywhere on the body, but their locations matched on soulmates. Steve sharing his Words had meant a lot to Bucky, and seeing them again, now, meant a lot to Barnes.

Hesitancy and trepidation fill him, however, as he slowly searches his own skin. Part of him wants to find Words, the other… he would be the worst thing imaginable to inflict on another human. He knows, Hydra trained him to be just that. Still, he searches. When a thorough investigation turns up nothing, he is at once relieved and disappointed. He tells himself it’s for the best, and returns to the hunt.

A full year after the events of D.C., Barnes has done what he can. Hydra bases all over the world are smoldering ruins, and every handler he’s ever had is either dead or in jail where he can’t reach them without causing civilian casualties, something Barnes is trying his hardest to avoid.

There are still holes (he resigns himself to the fact that there will always be holes) but he decides that it’s time to go in. He trusts Steve--and the Avengers--to keep him in line, and he wants to see his… friend, if that’s what Steve still is.

To the end of the line.

The promise urges him on, makes him believe there will be a welcome reception rather than a cold cell waiting for him (though a cold cell would be what he deserves) and he silently repeats it to himself as a mantra while he waits for Steve to find him.

It doesn’t take long. Barnes hears the sound of feet breach the perimeter of his safe house, the metallic reverberation he recognizes as Steve’s shield sliding onto his arm, and Barnes is ready. He has all his gear and possessions in a bag, and sits calmly in the living room waiting for Steve to enter. He’s too tense to try for a relaxed pose, so he goes for nonthreatening instead.

He knows Steve knows he’s inside. No doubt he can hear his heart race from where he lingers behind the door. Barnes can hear Steve’s elevated heartbeat and one other, probably Falcon, from where he sits. He doesn’t know why they’re lingering. Previous to this, he’s observed them barge into his abandoned safe houses with little to no hesitation.

On edge from nerves, Barnes gets a little impatient.

“It’s rude to keep people waiting, punk.”

The door flies open and Captain America bursts through, ready for a trap of some kind if the way his eyes scan the room are anything to go by. Barnes keeps his hands up in the universal sign for unarmed (even though that’s not technically true) while Falcon and Captain America do a sweep. Falcon does most of the actual sweeping, it seems, because Steve is too busy looking at Barnes like he wants to tackle him in a bearhug and never let go. It’s reassuring, but not actually something Barnes wants to try. He doesn’t fully trust himself still, and being confined, even by a hug, could lead to disastrous results.

Though he does remember that Steve gives really good hugs.

“Clear.” Falcon reports, eyes finally on Barnes.

Steve refocuses and straightens his posture, resuming the Captain America personna. “You ready to come in?”

He nods.

“Good.” Steve sighs. “Jerk.”

The gloved hand in front of him is an offer of trust, and Barnes is grateful for it. He accepts the hand and the help up, but quickly lets go before Steve can pull him into a hug. Steve seems to recognize his hesitation and doesn’t do more than nod. Barnes grabs his bag and follows them out to the waiting car.

“Bucky,” he does his best not to flinch, “what have you been doing?”

Barnes considers his answer. He knows Steve knows what his recent activities included, so that’s not really what he’s asking. He’s asking why.

“Therapy.”

The Falcon snorts.

“Buck…”

“I’m not--” he starts to correct, and he doesn’t miss the wounded look on Steve’s face, so he reassess. “I’m… trying, but I’m not him. Not yet. Too much still missing.”

“What do you want to be called then?” Falcon is the one to ask.

Asset. The Soldier whispers. “Barnes.” He says instead.

“Cool. I’m Sam, by the way. Nice to meet you.”

Barnes nodded. He could see that both men in the front were nervous, tense. Prudent of them. If Barnes was still following programming, allowing himself to be taken under the guise of civility would be an effective trap given Steve’s inclination toward trust and his desire to have his friend back. Barnes acknowledged this by trying to remain as nonthreatening as possible. He never reached for his bag, doesn’t pull anything out of his pockets, and doesn’t make any sudden movements. Talking to them might put them at ease, but Barnes can’t make the words come. He doesn’t know what to say, where to start.

Steve explains that they’re making their way to the hotel he and Sam had been operating out of in the city so that they can gather what they hadn’t taken with them, and then it’s straight to Avengers Tower in New York City via quinjet. Barnes raises an eyebrow at him, questioning his judgment.

Sam seems to pick up on his reluctance. “We aren’t tossing you in the deep end. There are security procedures in place, and you’ll have to clear… testing before you can move up to the residential floors.”

Barnes nods. They were taking precautions, good.

The detour to the hotel doesn’t take long. Both men are efficient and in a hurry, so Barnes waits calmly as they do everything they need to before he’s whisked away to a private airstrip. The quinjet lands as the car pulls to a stop and Barnes waits for Sam and Steve to exit the car before opening his own door and stepping out, bag in hand.

The redhead that exits the quinjet is a surprise, but he complies with her shrewd inspection as his memory gives him flashes. Nothing concrete, nothing coherent, but he knows he’s met her before. Finally, the Soldier gives him a name.

“Natalia.”

“Yasha.” She replies easily, still continuing the inspection. She’s found seven of his knives already and part of him, a quiet part, approves that her skills have remained sharp.

Steve looks confused, however.

“I take it you two have met.” Sam mutters, hefting his own bag further up his shoulder as he boards the aircraft.

“Several times.” Natalia confirms.

“Why didn’t you mention this sooner?” Steve asks, Captain America face on.

Natalia simply gives him a look. He deflates after a couple heartbeats and shakes his head, “It could have been important, Natasha, that’s all I’m saying.”

“It worked out fine, Steve.” Natal--Natasha shrugs, and guides him to a seat aboard the aircraft once she’s found his eleventh and final knife. She allows him to pick which chair to sit in, and then shows him where to stow his bag before returning to the cockpit.

“Barton, take us up.” Steve orders to someone already in the cockpit and the jet lifts off.

They head toward New York and Barnes isn’t sure he’s ready for this, but it’s too late to turn back now. Braced for the worst, he grits his teeth and repeats his mantra, To the end of the line, to the end of the line, to the end of the line…

____

Darcy dramatically threw herself down on the couch in Jane’s lab (the one that’s supposed to be there for emergency naps, but is rarely used for anything of the sort) and sighed loudly. She had had it up to here with Tony Stark and his Tony Stark bullshit. Just once it would be nice to go into his lab with a tablet for him to sign and leave within three minutes, signed document in hand, but no! Tony had to argue, had to debate, and whine, and bitch, and moan. Normally, Darcy could roll with it. On an average day, Darcy could dole it out in equal measure and--occasionally--come out on top, but today Stark was being particularly prickly and refused to even let her into the lab! She had to pull out the emergency Pepper override to gain access to his lair and then chased him around with the tablet while Dummy chased her with a fire extinguisher.

The whole mess had ended when Darcy, angry and fed up, had sighed dramatically (not unlike the one she’d just unleashed into the couch cushions) declared herself beaten and loudly made her way to the exit, even going so far as to have Jarvis open and close the lab door before quietly making her way to all of Tony’s appliances and unplugging them before severing their electrical cables entirely. Then, equally as quiet, she made her way back to the door and left without Tony noticing anything.

Now she played the waiting game. Tony would eventually require coffee or a shake and finding himself unable to get either, he would have to leave the lab. When he did Jarvis would notify her and she would pounce. Until then, she was going to chill in Jane’s lab.

“That sigh has Tony written all over it.” Jane commented, glancing briefly away from her Science to look at Darcy.

“What’s got his panties in a bunch today?” Darcy complained. “Like Tony’s always pretty much at a six when it comes to paperwork, but this? This was an eleven.”

“No idea.” Jane murmured. “Did you ask Jarvis?”

“Of course. J has my back, don’t you?”

“Indeed, Miss Lewis.” The AI agreed calmly. “While Sir is never keen on following procedure, today’s demonstration in the lab was a-typical. I believe he is under extreme stress, although I cannot accurately pinpoint the cause.”

Darcy sighed again. She’d moved into the Tower following Stark’s acquisition of Jane and her Rainbow Bridge research, but there wasn’t much call for an unpaid intern when Jane now had a full staff of actual scientist underlings to work for and with her. Darcy had made sure to train them in the proper care and feeding of mad geniuses such as Jane before agreeing to a position suggested to her by none other than Pepper Potts. Now, she’s the Avengers’ Social Media Liaison, in charge of monitoring the public’s opinion and reaction to said superheros on all major (and a few minor) social mediums. It was also her job to help the Avengers with their own accounts on the aforementioned mediums if they desired. Training Steve how to use Twitter had been marginally hilarious, and she had officially (paperwork and everything) banned all of them from using Tumblr. There was an official Avengers Tumblr account which she was in charge of, and if something awesome or of note happened there, it was shared, but for the most part, she spared them from the fandom that was Tumblr. The job is kind of perfect; her ridiculous knowledge of the internet combined with the PoliSci degree married happily into the job of her dreams. Plus the fat paycheck was nice.

Today, however, Darcy longed for the life of the unpaid intern simply so she wouldn’t have to deal with Stark.

Her musings were interrupted by Jarvis. “I have just been informed that Captain Rogers is returning to the Tower, with Mr. Barnes. He requests that all civilian personnel working directly with or for the team meet him in the conference room on level 75 in three hours.”

Silence inhabited the lab as Darcy and the others absorbed that information. Steve had been looking for Bucky Barnes since D.C., but he had always been just one step behind. Every time he came back empty handed, Darcy made a point of hosting a movie night within the next day or two to remind him that he still had friends, they all supported him and were there for him. Now?

Shit. She had to get on top of this. Bucky Barnes, a.k.a. the Winter Soldier was also a hot topic on social media, especially the first few months after D.C. when Black Widow had done an info dump of all Shield/Hydra files onto the internet. She and Tony had spent the better part of a week--no sleep--just sorting through everything they could find about each member of the team, and handling the backlash of public opinion. It had been crazy and Darcy still found herself correcting people who try to slander the Avengers using fragments of files from the dump. The Winter Soldier… as much as she was able to, she replied to and corrected people who chose to see the Winter Soldier as a villain rather than a victim, but there was an awfully long list of dead and not everyone understood how evil and corrupt and absolute brainwashing like that was. Reading the file on Barnes had been nightmare stuff, and she knew not everyone would want to see past the list of the dead. It would be an uphill battle to get public opinion higher.

Unless… she could work the childhood friends reunited angle, maybe. There was a decent portion of social media that liked the idea of a Bucky Barnes’ Redemption Story, and while she still wanted to point out that he hadn’t been willing or really even aware of the crimes he’d committed as the Winter Soldier, she was willing to bite her tongue in favor of working with that particular branch of the internet to boost opinion.

She had to work fast. There would no doubt be an outcry from certain government officials to damn Barnes to the fiery depths of hell for what they saw as his atrocities to the American people, but if she could get public opinion high enough first, then most of that rhetoric could be nipped in the bud rather quickly.

“J, can you get me on the phone with Steve?” Darcy requested, leaving Jane’s lab, tablet already in hand reviewing the carefully created headlines, tweets, posts, etc. that she and Pepper had prepared given the eventuality that Bucky would be recovered. There were a few of them depending on the circumstances in which he was recovered, and she needed to consult with Steve to determine which would be applicable.

“Connecting you now, Miss Lewis.”

There was a soft click in her bluetooth earpiece and then she heard the background noise of the quinjet’s engine. “Darcy, this isn’t--”

“Time is of the essence Cap, sorry.” Darcy steamrolled. “I need to know how soon we’re planning on releasing this, and I want to do it before someone beats us to it.”

She heard him sigh. “I don’t know. I haven’t talked to him about it.”

“Soon as you can, Apple Pie.” She ordered. “I’ll be at the ready when you are, but don’t make me do damage control. You know how angry damage control makes me.”

“Don’t feed the trolls.” Natasha supplied, smirk evident in her tone.

“Ooh, a party line, I like it. Is he on? Can I ask him myself?” Darcy requested.

“No.” Steve asserted firmly. “I’ll… get back to you. I expect you at the meeting, Darce.”

“Aye, aye Captain.” Darcy saluted even though Steve couldn’t see her. “Tasha, can you send me the relevant details, please and thank you.”

Steve’s tone went a little more Captain America, “Natasha…”

“She’s doing her job, Rogers, relax.” Natasha countered. “Texting you now, Darcy.”

Her phone beeped. “Excellent. See you when you get home.”

The line disconnected before Steve could make another protest, and Darcy busied herself with her job. She edited and added to the pool of information to be publicly released for the better part of two hours before Tony found her, grumbling about coffee and piss poor electronics.

She held the tablet out to him, page already up for him to sign. “Sign first, then you can have coffee.”

“Evil…” Tony muttered, but signed obligingly. Jarvis started the coffee machine for him as soon as he’s finished signing.

“So, did you hear the wayward babe is finally coming home?” Darcy made conversation.

Tony flinched. “Yes.”

Darcy eyed him over the top of her tablet. “You sound displeased… is this why you’re in a Mood?”

Tony looked offended. “I am not in a ‘Mood,’ Lewis. The comings and goings of Capcicle’s entourage makes no difference to me, whether they’re flying daredevils or Hydra assassins.”

“Former Hydra assassin.” Darcy corrected automatically. She has to control public opinion and that started with Avenger opinion.

“Is he though?” Tony whispered over the rim of his mug before taking a sip.

Darcy glared at him.

Tony waved her off before she could start. “I know the history, Lewis, I read the file same as you. I know he didn’t have a choice, I know the brainwashing was… intense, and I know that he’s not at fault for what happened. That doesn’t mean that he won’t revert, that he doesn’t potentially pose a threat to the people in the building. That’s all I’m saying.”

“This is the most secure building in the world, inside and out.” Darcy objected. “If something does go wrong, we’re well prepared. Besides, I don’t think Steve will let him up here until he’s sure.”

Tony rolled his eyes. “Cap doesn’t exactly make a good litmus test. Too eager to get his childhood friend back that he might--”

“Might ignore the danger to the other friends and civilians currently residing in the Tower?” Darcy raised a suspicious eyebrow.

Tony didn’t respond until he drained the cup. “Point, but who do you think Steve is going to put in charge of keeping the Soldier in check?”

“Uh, Steve.” Darcy shrugged.

Tony gave her a look like he’s waiting for her to catch up.

She did so fairly quickly, “You’re worried about Bucky hurting Steve.”

“I think Steve has a blind spot and it’s oddly Bucky shaped.”

“Well, as long as you’re not jealous…”

Tony scowled. “My friends are allowed to have other friends. Pepper and Rhodey are friends.”

“Okay, A: they should have friends that aren’t also your friends. And B: You just keep telling yourself that friendship was totally what I was talking about.”

She left Stark sputtering in favor of taking a coffee to Jane. She may not be lab monkey any more, but she was still BFFs with the astrophysicist. Jane was appropriately appreciative and Darcy perched herself on the couch to continue sorting through social media sites to make sure no one had yet caught wind of Bucky’s return.

As hour two came to an end, the residents were informed of Cap’s return and that all passages between the roof and the holding area were temporarily closed until Bucky and Steve were situated. Bruce’s presence was requested, but other than that, no one was allowed out until Jarvis gave the all clear.

Darcy listened politely and then went back to her tablet. The path between the roof and the holding level was direct. One elevator ride down and poof, like magic you’ve arrived. She’s sure it’s just a precaution to eliminate use of said elevator, but it still seemed a little extreme in her humble opinion.

The third hour flew by in a blur of hashtags, flow charts, and polls. Nothing had been released, but Darcy was one Ctrl+P away from informing the world that Steve and Bucky were once again besties. She’d set her tablet to alert her to all activity on the #UpAllNightToGetBucky, #WinterIsComing, #BuckyWatch, #WinterSoldier, #BuckyBarnes, and any other Bucky Barnes related tags (filtering of course for the GoT reference). Jarvis was invaluable in this because he automatically sorted further into positive, negative, and undecided/neutral posts so that she could keep track of how many were in each category. From there her flow carts would determine the next phase. It was all set up, she was as ready as she could be, and all that was left was the word from Cap.

Jarvis reminded the two of them that they had a meeting to attend, so Darcy dragged Jane away from Science so they could make their way to the 75th floor conference room. Already seated when they arrived was the Avengers, Sam Wilson, Maria Hill, Pepper, and a couple PAs. Darcy sat calmly between Thor and Clint while Jane sat on Thor’s other side. They were all still waiting on Steve, so to pass the time Darcy started a chat with Pepper and Maria to make sure the Stark Industries side of thing was taken care of. It was, of course, because the two of them were scary competent, but Darcy had to check.

Steve didn’t keep them waiting too long. He had a decidedly excited but cautious air about him when he strode through the door, instantly catching everyone’s attention.

“He’s doing well.” Steve began. “He came in willingly and he seems to be mostly… with us.”

“Mostly with us?” Tony interjected.

Steve shrugged one massive shoulder. “He’s still got a few gaps in his memory, but he doesn’t work for Hydra.”

“I agree.” Natasha added. “He appears to have broken programming, but a precautions are always prudent.”

“What kind of precautions?” Darcy asked.

Darcy listened to the list of safety measures in place, frowning slightly. It boiled down to a chaperone at all times, Tower access restrictions, not being allowed outside the Tower, and a limited number of people in the room at the same time. It sounded a lot like a fancy prison sentence to Darcy, and she expressed her opinion to the others.

“You’re treating him like a prisoner?”

Steve winced. “I don’t like it either, but we have to be careful. Until we know he won’t try to--”

“That’s bullshit.” Darcy interrupted. “He’s a goddamn sniper Steve, even before Hydra got ahold of him, he was trained to be patient and wait.”

Clint pointed at her. “She has a point.”

Natasha held a hand up to stall Steve’s comment. “You have a better idea?”

“I hardly think Miss Lewis is qualified to make that decision.” Hill objected politely.

Thor frowned at Hill. Such a simple gesture had such a profound effect; Hill shut up and made a continue motion to Darcy. Thor was awesome.

“He’s recovering from a severe mind fuck, and even with the best of intentions, he’s going to have bad days. Hell, you all have your bad days.” Darcy stated. “Either you trust him or you don’t, but you shouldn’t treat him like a prisoner because that’s sure as fuck not the way to get him to trust you.”

The team seemed to consider it, which Darcy was grateful for. She’d grown close to most of the team over the last year and it was good to know that they valued her opinion at least a little.

“Still waiting for the better idea, there Lewis.” Tony pushed.

Darcy shrugged. “Keep the chaperone, but give him a room of his own, a place he can be alone and have privacy that isn’t a holding cell. If you’re still super worried about any shenanigans, Jarvis is totally capable of warning you guys of danger.”

“Miss Lewis is correct. I am fully capable of monitoring Sgt. Barnes while he is away from company.” Jarvis supplied helpfully.

Darcy smiled. “Thanks for having my back, J.”

“Always, Miss Lewis.”

“Stop flirting with my AI.” Tony glared.

Darcy threw her hand to her forehead grandly, “Never! Ours is a love that won’t be denied, Stark!”

“Children.” Natasha scolded.

Darcy and Tony turned sheepishly--okay, Darcy was sheepish, Tony was Tony--to the assassin and refrained from further outbursts. Most of the room looked more amused than annoyed, and Darcy smiled to herself. She wasn’t always completely ridiculous, no matter what Hill believed, but there was a benefit to easing the tension, especially with this crowd, and Darcy filled that roll happily and easily when the need arose.

“I hate to put us back on topic,” Hill began, “but there is a difference between a Bad Day with Sgt. Barnes and a Bad Day with one of you. I’m afraid Sgt. Barnes may be more liable to attack those residing in the Tower, and while Miss Lewis’ optimistic outlook is… endearing, we have to be realistic.”

Steve grunted grudgingly in agreement. “Still, Darcy has a point. We should extend a little trust.”

“Very well.” Hill nodded curtly.

“If Sgt. Barnes is to be moved into a room, there are a few available.” Pepper scanned her tablet. “Steve, do you know his preferences?” Steve accepted the tablet she handed him and quickly scanned it. He tapped a few times and then passed the tablet to Natasha. At her nod, the tablet was returned to Pepper. “I will make the necessary arrangements.”

“Thank you.”

“My pleasure, Steve.”

“Now, I’m standing by the original plan as far as introductions goes. I don’t want to overwhelm him, so it may be a while before we make introductions outside of the team.” He directed this to Jane, Darcy, Pepper, Hill, and the other non-Avengers in the room. “Let him get used to the people that’ll be around him the most.”

“You got it Boss Man.” Darcy decided to be fine with that. She made her way between each of the Avengers tending to their various social media needs rather frequently, so she was sure she’d meet Bucky Barnes sooner rather than later. Speaking of. “Decided when to let the cat out of the bag?”

“Soonest would be good.” Pepper encouraged.

Steve sighed, but nodded. “Go ahead. Meeting dismissed.”

Darcy’s hands flew across her tablet as she coordinated simultaneous releases to the major sites, but within seconds the information was out there, and Darcy sat back and prepared herself for the oncoming storm.

____

It had been three days since his arrival at the Tower. At first, he’d been in an isolation/observation area where he’d stayed while various people evaluated his mental state. Shrinks to probe and question how much of him was James Barnes and how much was still Hydra, he tolerated for Steve. He knew it was conditional to his remaining at the Tower. He’d drawn a line at medical testing, however. Doctors and labs and needles and restraints… no. He wasn’t ready for that.

Steve had been understanding, as had the doctor they’d brought in to run the initial exam. Dr. Banner had been calm and soft spoken, but it wasn’t enough to get him to submit to tests. A compromise was offered: allow Jarvis, the building’s AI, to run a couple of scans, and they’d call it quits unless something important came up in the results. Since he wouldn’t even have to move from the couch he’d been lounging on, Barnes had agreed.

Once the results came back with a clean bill of health, and the shrinks had had their turn, Barnes was given a room upstairs with the rest of the residents.

Barnes looked over his new room with a trained eye. He couldn’t help it. Part of his mind was already plotting escape routes and potential locations for emergency hidey-holes, but another part admired the view. Barnes tried to focus on that part. It was spectacular and far enough up that outside entry was unlikely at best.

The apartment itself was simple. Living area with attached kitchen, a bedroom with a (fucking huge) closet, and a bathroom. It was posh without being overtly opulent, and it suited him just fine. It was miles above what he expected to be living in (see: cell) and Barnes settled himself in.

“Do you like it?” Steve asked.

He understood and respected Steve and his friends’ caution about leaving him to his own devices in the common areas of the Tower, and giving him his own room where he could be alone if he needed to, was more than he deserved, so it wasn’t hard to be completely satisfied with what they’d given him.

In response to Steve’s question, Barnes nodded.

“Good. So, there’s a TV and Stark’s already filled the apartment with every electronic you could possibly need.” Steve’s tone stated clearly that he believed the number to be excessive.

“I’ll bet.” He murmured. Barnes hadn’t met Tony Stark yet, but from what Steve had said, he was as much of a sarcastic ass as his father had been.

“Gym and shooting range are one floor down, public kitchen and common area one more below that, and the rest of the team has quarters above.” Steve continued.

“Anyone else bunked on this floor?” The apartment wasn’t nearly big enough to encompass the entire floor.

“Sam has an apartment on this level, as does Darcy, and there are a few empty suits for guests and such.” Steve nodded.

“Sam Wilson, call sign Falcon.” Barnes clarified. “He’s not special enough to have his own level like the rest of you?”

Steve smirked. “Jerk. Stark rebuilt the Tower to include floors for each of the Avengers after the Battle of Manhattan, but Sam didn’t sign on until D.C. Besides, he’s got his own place in D.C., the room here is just for when he’s in New York.”

“Darcy?”

“Darcy Lewis, civilian; she works as our Social Media Liaison.”

“Civilian.” Barnes gave Steve a look, questioning his judgment. They’d been doing so well too.

“All apartments are coded to the resident, Sgt. Barnes.” Jarvis supplied. “Unless Miss Lewis has granted you permission, you will be unable to access her rooms. The same is true if she were to attempt to gain access into your apartment.”

He thought about it. Barnes didn’t know whether or not he’d be able to break into the apartments without clearance; he’d never gone up against an AI running building security. He resolved to test this at a later date, but for now, he accepted. If it came to it, Barnes trusted that if the AI couldn’t keep him out, it could alert others to the attempt and they would respond with all due force.

“Acceptable.”

He was given a day to himself to get acquainted with his room, and he took it gladly. The past three days were like being under a microscope, constantly being watched, being seen. He’d been uncomfortable to say the least, but forced himself to comply. Now that he had his own space, he felt like a weight was off his shoulders.

Steve wanted him to come to a tour, meet the last hold outs. Barnes asked for a day first. When Steve agreed, Barnes was grateful enough to give him a hug. It was quick but it was good, and Steve left smiling.

Caving to his instincts, Barnes thoroughly explored the apartment and memorized its layout and contents. He tested the windows, he tested the doors, and unpacked only when satisfied that he was secure. He crafted four separate hidey-holes around the apartment where he placed money, weapons, and various forms of false identification. Just in case. Once he was satisfied, Barnes took a nap.

Catnaps and power naps were all he allowed himself. If he slept for too long, the nightmares woke him, and he had a harder time remembering when and where he was when he awoke. Naps provided the rest his body required and spared his mind from further harm. Most of the time. He did still occasionally dream, but not every dream turned cold.

He filled his day with routine and allowed himself to feel safe.

The next day, Steve met him at the door when he was ready to meet the others. Steve led him to the common area where he was introduced to Clint and Thor, both of whom seemed friendly. Barnes automatically cataloged strengths and weaknesses as he saw them, but something in Clint’s gaze told him the archer was doing the same thing. It wasn’t about trust. It was just training.

Barnes felt oddly reassured by that.

The general greetings and threat assessments through, Thor was the first to make real conversation.

“Your arrival has brought much activity to the Tower, friend.” Thor smiled genuinely. “Tis a shame the Lady Darcy is away; I am certain she would be most interested in meeting the man currently responsible for her ever persistent battle with the Media.”

Barnes raised an eyebrow. Darcy was the name of the girl living on his floor; Steve had mentioned her job, but Barnes admitted to himself that he didn’t fully understand what he’d meant.

“Not sure what that means.” He begrudgingly fessed up.

“Darcy works on maintaining our public image.” Clint explained. “She’s been practically glued to her tablet since Steve brought you to the Tower.”

Barnes felt he should apologize to Darcy if he ever met her; he was certain his public image was not a good one. He winced.

“It was not my intent to cause distress.” Thor apologized. “The Lady Darcy is greatly skilled in her work and fierce in battle; she will return victorious, I am certain.”

Thor had an odd manner, but Barnes appreciated the sincerity. There wasn’t much of it directed his way in recent memory, but he found he liked it. “Sounds like a dame with moxie.”

Steve chuckled. “That’s one way of putting it.”

Thor jumped on the subject with enthusiasm. It seemed he and ‘The Lady Darcy’ were extremely close, and he eagerly told the story of how they’d met in the desert of New Mexico. It was an interesting story, to say the least, and it granted Barnes some insight, not only into Thor, but also into Jane, his lady love, Darcy, and even Clint. The archer supplemented the story from what he remembered of his time there. Barnes relaxed marginally as the story unfolded, and even found himself chuckling quietly at times.

The comradery reminded him of nights spent around campfires or huddled in trenches with Steve and the Howling Commandos; it startled him, but Barnes accepted the budding friendship the two Avengers offered. Part of him cautioned against it. If he lost control or reverted to the Winter Soldier, these men would be the ones responsible for taking him out. They would need to put aside personal feelings in order to stop him at all costs. Another part of him longed for company. He was lonely, had been lonely for years, even if the Soldier didn’t really recognize the feeling. Barnes did, and it was nice to not feel it for once.

___

The press was getting faster. The major news networks latched onto the story less than an hour after its appearance on Twitter, and Darcy was working as fast as she was able to keep up with opinion polls and rhetoric. For every image posted of the Winter Soldier, Darcy posted one of Bucky or a reminder of the horrific things he’d been put through. She wasn’t alone, either; there was a surprising number of people exceedingly thrilled to hear that Captain America’s best friend had been recovered.

She tried to keep reminding people that he was human, just like she did for the others. If the people stopped thinking about the Avengers as people, bad things usually followed. Every now and then she had to practically spam Twitter with snapshots of the team doing innocent and everyday things to rehumanize them, but the problem was: she didn’t have any recent photos of Bucky to do that with.

By day two she had scheduled multiple interviews with different networks and talk shows. Going in front of the camera wasn’t something she did because Darcy herself wasn’t a public figure, not really. When the media demanded an interview (like they were doing now) she typically went with whichever Avenger was available at the time (usually Tony or Steve, although there was one memorable occasion with Thor) and talked them through what to say, what not to say, how to handle certain hosts, topics and traps to watch out for, that sort of thing. It was never her in front of the camera.

This time was no different, but the available Avenger was Tony rather than Steve--which she still fervently believed would have been better--and she fretted the entire flight to LA because Tony could be a tad unpredictable in front of cameras (see: “I am Iron Man” and the fucking stupid challenge to the Mandarin, Oh My Fucking God!).

“You need to relax.” The asshole in question commented.

“I can’t, I’m writing official apologies and disclaimers for when you inevitably say the wrong thing.” Darcy glared.

Tony actually looked mildly offended. “I’m not going to say the wrong thing, Lewis. I’ve been handling the media longer than you’ve been alive.”

“Don’t make me list all the ways that statement only proves my point.” Darcy threatened.

Thankfully, the host for tonight was Ellen, and she and Tony got along swimmingly. Darcy wasn’t worried about Ellen attempting to trap Tony into saying something regrettable especially since their interview was supposed to center around the Maria Stark Foundation and how Stark industries and the Avengers help with the aftermath of an event, but the host for tomorrow was not so Avengers friendly. Conan wasn’t against the Avengers per se, but neither was he always on their side. Steve would absolutely have been the better choice for Conan, but he was with Bucky at the Tower for the foreseeable future. John Oliver had expressed his enthusiastic support, and while he couldn’t do an interview, he did promise to use the comments that Darcy had crafted in regard to Bucky’s return on his show on Sunday. The Tonight Show with Jimmy Fallon and The Daily Show were scheduled for their return to New York in two days, and Colbert had already lined up an interview for when his show premiered in September.

In truth, Darcy’s big worry was that someone on one of these networks would do their homework and realize that the Winter Soldier was the weapon used to take out Howard and Maria Stark. When she and Tony had read it in the file, she had honestly been worried about what Tony would say or do when Bucky finally let Steve drag him in. Thankfully he’d been really good about it. He believed wholeheartedly that it hadn’t been Bucky’s fault, that Hydra was to blame, and he held no ill will toward the guy. Darcy wasn’t so sure that the general public would take it as well.

In addition to the TV talk show circuit, Tony was scheduled to do Skype interviews with CNN, BBC America, MSNBC, NBC, CBS, and, weirdly, Fox News. Darcy was not looking forward to that particular interview. Darcy, herself, was in charge of the print news interviews since she wouldn’t have to appear on camera. She was working on the Washington Post, New York Times, LA Times, and USA Today interviews. She’d already submitted interviews with various magazines including Newsweek, Times, People, and World Report.

Needless to say, Darcy hadn’t set her tablet down long enough to do more than catch a few hours sleep every night and eat.

After four days of interviews and jetting across the country, Darcy and Tony finally returned to the Tower. It had gone about as well as Darcy could have hoped. The Fox interview had been as hilariously disastrous as she’d predicted, but there was no preventing that. The subject of Tony’s parents did come up, but he handled it well and from what Darcy was reading in the Twittersphere, the public was taking his acceptance of the event to heart. Most anyway. There were always naysayers and people determined to make a villain out of every Avenger on the team, but the public opinion was within acceptable range.

Until Bucky finally showed his face, or if he did something horrible, the public opinion was her bitch. When Bucky inevitably came out of the Tower, whether on a casual stroll or with the Avengers, she would have more work to do because the discussion would spike once again, but for now, she had things under control.

Which of course meant something had to go wrong.

The day she returned to the Tower, someone (probably someone who watched Fox news like it was a reliable news source) decided to reflood the internet with shaky cell footage of the showdown between Steve and the Winter Soldier on the bridge in D.C. It went viral, of course, and while it wasn’t the best quality, it did capture a very clear image of the Winter Soldier without his mask. It was not flattering and it did not promote feel good emotions in regard to Bucky’s character. She cringed every time the image was retweeted, and there were only so many images of 1940s Bucky that people would swallow before it just didn’t matter any more. The way he had been before Hydra was not the way he was now and there was no going back. The big metal arm wasn’t something that could be reversed. She needed a more recent image, and there was only one place to get it.

___

Barnes and Steve were relaxing in the common area after lunch. The TV was on playing some news channel that Barnes tried to focus on. It was a little unsettling listening to reports and interviews about himself; he was used to being a ghost, but he made himself watch. Steve had pulled up the interviews Stark had done with some news networks, so Barnes focused on the TV.

Stark was very much like the Howard Barnes remembered. Confident, cocky, charismatic, and he played those traits to his advantage in interviews. He’d heard a little about the bad blood between Tony and Howard from Steve, but not a whole lot of detail. Steve had claimed it wasn’t his story to tell, but that he wanted to warn Barnes that Howard was a sore subject best avoided if possible. Barnes accepted that. There was shit he didn’t want to talk about either.

The rapid footsteps coming their direction weren’t familiar to him, but a glance at Steve assured him that whoever it was wasn’t a threat. Steve didn’t seem concerned, so Barnes refocused on the interview. Not long after the footsteps, he heard the sound he now associated with someone working on a touch screen. Since coming to the Tower he’d heard the sound a lot. Frustrated grumbling followed shortly after.

Finally, the person responsible entered the room. Barnes looked at the newcomer and for a very brief moment thought he was seeing someone from Before. She was a bombshell! Unlike the thin, underfed sticks that seemed to populate the media today, she was a blast from the past with the curves of a pin-up. She had a frown on her face, which was a shame, but she when she looked up from her tablet, her gaze drifted first to the TV, then to Steve, and finally on him. Expecting something like surprise or maybe fear, which he’d come to expect from civilians (and she was definitely civilian), her face shifted into a put-upon expression and she sighed.

“Okay, I'm just going to say it. Barnes, you look like a shaggy murderous hobo.”

His mouth twitched into something akin to a smile. She had moxie. Before he could comment, however, Steve started choking, which was weird because he didn’t have any food or drink at the moment.

The brunette turned to Steve, “Breathe the air, not the spit, Cap.”

He waved that he was okay, with the oddest expression on his face.

The girl retrained her attention back to Barnes and continued, “You're making my job so much harder than it needs to be. Seriously. Shave and a haircut, I will lend you the two bits if that's what it takes."

With that she left, continuing through the common area like telling a dangerous assassin to clean himself up was a normal thing. Maybe for her it was. He watched her retreat through the far door, further appreciating the view.

“Who was…” Barnes finally turned back to look at Steve. The look on his friend’s face stalled his initial question. Steve looked gobsmacked, but also like Christmas had come early. It was utterly ridiculous and Barnes had no idea why his friend was giving him such a strange look. “What?”

“She said the thing!”

Barnes continued to give him a look he hoped conveyed exactly how little sense that statement made.

Steve’s excitement dropped and he moved into confusion. “You don’t remember?”

“Remember what Stevie?”

Steve scratched the back of his head, a frown of confusion on his face before understanding hit him. “Oh, right. Left arm.”

“What.”

“Buck, that girl was Darcy Lewis. Your soulmate.”

Barnes blinked, looked down at his metal arm, looked back to Steve. “What.”

Steve, the little shit, just relaxed back in his chair with a smile on his face. “That’s actually a little perfect.”

“Punk.” Barnes put a warning edge to his tone. “I don’t have Words, she can’t be my soulmate.”

“You did.” Steve told him seriously. “Framed the elbow of your left arm.”

Barnes instinctively looked even though the words wouldn’t be there. “They’re gone now.”

“The arm is, but she’s still very real.” Steve pointed out. “So, what are you gonna do about it?”

What was he going to do?

He had a soulmate. Someone the universe decided was his perfect match. Someone he could spend the rest of his life with.

What was he going to do?

Barnes adopted a very successful avoidance tactic. If Darcy was about, he was not. He learned her routine so that he could alter his own, he avoided the labs (he did that anyway though), and he took meals inside his own apartment if Darcy was going to group meals.

Steve disapproved, but it was Barnes’ choice. The punk recognized that and didn’t spill the beans to Darcy, but he did gently remind Barnes that what he was doing was not something he approved of.

He made one consolation. Barnes did get a shave and a haircut. He kept it longer than he had Before, but he managed it now. He didn’t want to inflict himself upon Darcy, and if he could make her job easier by presenting himself a little better, he was willing to do that. He even ventured outside the Tower with Steve and Clint to try a little hole in the wall restaurant that Clint had been raving about. He knew people snapped pictures of them; he let it happen. The thank you basket (full of different coffee grounds) he found outside his apartment the next day made him smile. Thankfully, that moment was just between him and Jarvis.

Steve apparently wasn’t the only one who disapproved of his avoidance plan.

Over the weeks he’d carried on with his plan, Natalia had been sending him increasingly obvious death glares whenever he left or avoided a room with Darcy. Her agitation showed more and more in their sparring sessions, as she steadily took less and less care to avoid causing real damage.

She had him trapped in a headlock, arms and legs pinned or disabled, when Barnes finally addressed the issue. “You seem upset.”

“What gave you that impression?” She didn’t even sound out of breath.

“Oh,” he tried to twist free and failed, “little things.”

She reluctantly released him when he tapped the mat. “Whatever your issue is, deal with it swiftly. There’s only so much nonsense she will take.”

Barnes stared vacantly at the ceiling. Part of him hoped that’s exactly what would happen. If she lost every inclination to be near him, she’d be safe from him. He didn’t want to hurt her or cause her distress, and avoiding her was for the best. Another part of him berated himself more than Steve did to get off his ass and talk to her, explain what he was trying to do and why. That part of him hoped she would forgive him and be willing to get to know him. Barnes believed that part of himself was very foolish.

“She has my Words.”

Natalia froze. He could feel her stillness as she stood next to him. He allowed her to realize what he had been doing and why and waited for her to come to the same conclusion that he had. When her face invaded his vision, she did not look pleased. He couldn’t blame her.

“дурак. Talk to her.”

Barnes frowned.

Natalia’s expression resolved into something determined but distant. “You remember the Red Room and Hydra; the training, the conditioning. You fight it, you tore down their bases and killed their men to stick it to them and to prove to yourself you were free.” She knelt next to him and rested a hand on his metal shoulder. “We both still carry scars from that life, but here’s something I have learned since being free: love is the best fuck you.”

She stood and started walking to the locker room. “You deserve happiness, Yasha, and so does she.”

Barnes spent another hour on the floor, thinking.

______

Darcy was professional. Mostly. Sort of. She could handle rejection, it wasn’t a completely foreign concept. Still, usually she knew why someone rejected her. Barnes hadn’t even spoken to her, but he avoided her like the plague. She wondered if the comment she made about getting a haircut had somehow offended him, but he’d actually done what she’d asked, so she didn’t think that was the case.

She would ask, but he was very good at avoiding her. The most she saw of him was his backside leaving a room she was entering. It was a nice backside, yes, but she wanted a conversation--and explanation--and that required him to face her. Eventually, she got frustrated enough to ask Steve in one of the rare moments the two of them weren’t together. Unfortunately, all Steve could tell her was that Barnes was working through some issues (“Thank you, Captain Obvious”) but that he was certain he’d come around eventually.

In the meantime, Darcy did her job. Her own personal feelings were studiously ignored in favor of keeping up public opinion. The outing he’d taken with Steve and Clint had helped a lot, but it made people want more. Who could blame them? He was mysterious and new and hot… Yes, Darcy could admit that he was hot like burning, but that was par for the course with the Avengers. All of them were superhuman specimens of Gorgeous. After a year living with them, she’d rather thought she’d been a little desensitized to it, but Barnes…

Focus. Be professional.

Darcy had enlisted Clint and Steve’s help with capturing more images of Barnes, since he avoided her and by extension, her camera. Clint had managed to get one of him working out with Thor which was both adorable and a little scary. The only reason she’d felt it was a good idea to post it was because both Thor and Barnes were grinning like losers. Steve’s contribution was one awkwardly hilarious selfie of the two of them. That one had a lot of hits.

Today, she and Steve were scheduled to hang out. It irked her a little that she now had to schedule such things because of Barnes, but she adapted. He was Steve’s best friend and she was thrilled that he’d come to live at the Tower and everything. She just wished he’d stop running away.

The two of them were chilling in front of the TV watching Tony do yet another interview. Colbert’s new show had finally premiered and the two of them were excited to see it. To her delight, Steve actually really dug Stephen Colbert and Jon Stewart and their satirical take on the news. He’d said that their reporting was some of the most honest available, and also hilarious. She agreed and had proceeded to show him as much of their coverage of important events as she could get her hands on.

While Tony and Colbert were bantering on the TV, she caught Steve smiling fondly.

Darcy, ever the diplomat, decided to comment, “What’s on your mind Steve?”

“He’s actually quite good at this.” Steve allowed.

She nodded along like she agreed completely. “Well, he is a talk show host, so…”

Steve shot her a look. “Not who I was talking about.”

“Tony?” Darcy feigned ignorance. “Tony Sarcastic Asshole Stark?”

Steve wasn’t stupid, he knew what she was doing. “You forgot genius, billionaire, playboy, philanthropist.”

“Of course. How careless of me.” Darcy sighed.

They both laughed a little.

“You know, I’m glad the two of you actually get along.” Darcy allowed, honestly. “There was a lot of… angst in the beginning.”

Steve rubbed the back of his neck, contrite. “That was probably my fault.”

“No.” Darcy shook her head. “I think you can both take the blame for that.”

“Still… It’s better, we’re better now. He’s a decent guy.”

Darcy snorted. “Don’t let him hear you say that.”

“Heaven forbid.” Steve agreed.

Darcy absently messed with the sleeve of her left arm. It was something she found herself doing more and more frequently, but she mostly managed to catch herself and stop before anyone commented. Clint has asked once, and she’d glazed over the subject very briefly. Her Words were there, she’d say and leave it at that. Words were personal, and it was usually all she’d have to say to get someone to drop the subject. Clint hadn’t said anything, but she could see the gears in his mind turning. She’d bet he could guess why she fiddled with them more than she used to.

This time she noticed she was messing with her sleeve when Steve looked at her elbow a little intently. She stopped and sat on her hands, blush creeping its way up her cheeks. “Nervous habit.”

“I make you nervous?” He seemed surprised and a little hurt.

“No!” She promised quickly. “It’s just... “ She signed, real frustration in her tone this time. “You have Words, yeah?”

Steve nodded.

“Did you get… anxious or nervous before you met your soulmate?”

“I haven’t met mine yet, but,” he reclined a little in his chair, thoughtful, “I suppose, yeah, I get nervous sometimes. Mostly they make me hopeful.”

Darcy pursed her lips. She knew better than to say what she was really thinking, it wasn’t her place, but she nodded in response to his statement. “I am hopeful, but sometimes…”

“You wish they’d just hurry the hell up, right?” Steve smiled.

“Exactly.”

“It’ll happen, Darce. Trust me.”

Darcy sighed again and nodded. She refocused on the TV and Stark, and she and Steve chilled for a few hours until she decided she was tired enough to sleep. She bade him goodnight and made her way to her apartment.

She didn’t know Steve’s Words any more than he knew hers, but she’d bet a lot of money that he was wrong. He had met his soulmate and the two of them were just too stubborn to notice. She grumbled to herself about men and their stubbornness, as there seemed to be a surplus going around, and fell into a fitful sleep.

___

Tony Stark was a persistent ass.

From day one, he wanted to get a better look at the arm. Barnes did not feel inclined to let him near it, but neither was he capable of fixing everything on his own. Routine maintenance was easy, but anything else? His handlers or a Hydra mechanic had repaired major damage. Barnes recognized that, as a genius mechanic and engineer, Tony was best suited for the job of repairs.

Barnes, however, was stubborn.

He’d taken minor damage during his year away from Hydra and Steve, and it hadn’t affected performance enough to warrant letting anyone close to it. The problem steadily got worse (as mechanical issues were wont to do, left unattended), and finally came to a head during a sparring match with Steve.

A complicated maneuver intended to put Steve on his ass wound up causing the gears of the arm to seize, rendering it completely inert and useless. Steve laughed, the punk, and dragged him to see Stark.

Jarvis guided them to Bruce’s lab, where the two mad scientists were debating the merits of chemotherapy as a cancer treatment. Barnes didn’t catch a lot of the debate, and truthfully didn’t care so much. His arm was stuck at an awkward angle and he wanted it fixed.

Steve had to clear his throat to get Stark and Banner to shut up long enough to notice they had company. Stark took one look at Barnes and gave one choked off snort before schooling his features as best he could and looking innocently between the two of them.

Barnes wanted to hit him.

Restraining the urge, Barnes settled for grumbling, “I need a mechanic.”

“Fantastic!” Stark grinned, gesticulating wildly as he always did when excited. “You’re in luck because I happen to know a brilliant mechanic right here in the Tower.” He didn’t even seem to notice or care that he smacked his hand into something that looked expensive as he talked.

“Tony…” Bruce scolded.

Stark waved his hands again, “I know, it’s rude to toot my own horn, but I sometimes I just can’t help myself.”

“No, Tony,” Bruce now actually looked moderately concerned, “you disturbed the sample.”

“What?” Stark turned to look and frowned when he finally noticed what he’d hit his hand against earlier. “Is it still stable?”

“Stark?” Steve edged closer to the madman, concerned.

“I need to take some readings.” Bruce murmured. “Did any get on you?”

Stark looked down at his hands, “Uh, no?”

Bruce pulled a handheld device from a nearby shelf and began waving the wand part near the container that Stark had assaulted. Beeps and clicks emitted from the device and Barnes recognized it as a geiger counter. It was beeping and clicking rather fast. Face tense in concern, Banner shifted the wand Stark’s direction and it continued to beep and click at a faster than comfortable pace.

“Stark!” Steve had gone full Captain America now.

“I’m fine!” Stark protested.

Banner shook his head. “You need decontamination, Tony.”

“Bruce.” Stark objected.

Steve apparently wasn’t having it. He hit a button on the wall and then bodily shoved Stark into the now-open shower. Stark squawked but, although grudgingly, didn’t try to exit the decontamination room.

Barnes gave Steve a look, because as much as that had probably been the right move, it was also the stupid move. Whatever had been on Stark was now making Steve beep and click. Banner just gave him a look over the top of his device, and Steve sighed, but dutifully walked into the shower as well. Banner hit another button next to the first, and the door slid down to give the two of them privacy as they stripped and showered. Once it the door was closed, Banner moved to deal with the container.

The door wasn’t soundproof, however, so a short time after it shut, Barnes and Banner were treated to an interesting conversation.

“Sweet baby Jesus, would you look at that,” Stark muttered rapidly.

“Tony, not really the time…”

“No, Steve, look.”

A moment of only the sound of water, and then, “Holy shit.”

Banner was an amusing shade of crimson, but somehow Barnes didn’t think seeing Stark naked would make Steve curse like that. At least, not in that tone. It was probably something else.

The decontamination did its thing quickly and Banner reached hesitantly for the button. He hovered over it, “You two okay?”

“No longer radioactive, I will get back to you on the rest.” Stark answered.

Banner hit the release and the door opened to Stark and Steve dripping wet, and only wearing towels. Barnes scanned them both quickly to make sure they were unhurt and unchanged (never knew with radiation). They seemed in fine health, however, and Barnes was ready to pester Stark to fix his damn arm when he noticed something.

Whether subconsciously, from habit, or on purpose, both men wore the towels low around their hips. Barnes knew Steve’s Words were on his hip, and there, as it should be the word “Captain” was scrawled in messy but readable script. In precisely the same place on Stark’s hip were his Words: “Mr. Stark.”

Barnes laughed until he cried.

When he’d finally regained a little composure, Steve was sort of glaring at him and Stark was pouting.

“That’s just hurtful.”

Barnes gave Stark a look that stated he really didn’t care. Stark rolled his eyes and gestured for him to follow as he left Bruce’s lab.

“Tony.” Steve admonished.

Stark looked at him over his shoulder. “What? His arm needs repair, I’m not going to let the fact that he’s an asshole stop me from helping. How hypocritical would that be?”

“You’re in a towel.” Steve tried again.

“As are you, but you don’t see me complaining.”

Steve crossed his arms over his chest, determined, and glared Stark down. The fact that Steve was only in a fluffy green towel (because of course the towels for Bruce’s lab were green) should have made the look less intimidating, but it really didn’t.

After a moment, Stark rolled his eyes again and requested, “Jarvis, could you send Lewis for some clothes for me and Steve?”

“At once, Sir.”

“Good. We’ll be in my lab.”

With that, he kept walking and Barnes was forced to follow if he wanted his arm fixed. Avoiding Darcy would be a lot harder if he was forced into the same space while Stark repaired his arm, but there wasn’t much he could do about it. He resolved not to say anything. He could look dour and intimidating, and while he didn’t want to make her scared of him, if it was the only way to make her go away, he would.

“I am capable of fetching my own clothes.” Steve protested without heat.

Barnes shot him a look. If he had to be poked and prodded, he wanted Steve there to keep him grounded. He didn’t know whether or not maintenance on the arm would trigger a relapse, and he really didn’t want to hurt Stark (most of the time).

“I didn’t say I was leaving, Jerk. Relax.” Steve shoved his flesh and bone shoulder.

Upon entering the lab, Stark directed Barnes to sit on a small stool. It wasn’t the most comfortable piece of furniture, but it wasn’t the Chair and clearly wasn’t built to restrain anyone. Barnes sat.

Stark didn’t seem to care in the least that he was the next best thing to naked as he began tracking down tools and issuing orders to Jarvis. A holographic projection of Barnes’ metal arm appeared before him, and he watched as Stark used the holo to examine the inner workings rather than take him apart. He’d never seen the blueprints or anything before, so Barnes looked on with fascination as Stark did.

Despite his focus he still heard when Darcy entered the lab. He quickly schooled his features, but didn’t look at her.

Until he heard Steve say, “What happened to you?”

He snapped to attention and looked her over carefully. Darcy was in her usual long sleeves and jeans, but she was sporting a bruise on her cheek that looked an awful lot like someone hit her. He also noticed scrapes on the first two knuckles of her right hand. Despite this, she smiled cheerily at Steve (leering appreciatively at him in a towel).

“I think I should be asking you that.” She teased.

Steve seemed to remember his state of undress and a faint blush crept up his cheeks, but he didn’t let her redirect the conversation.

“You look like you’ve been in a fight.” Steve gently took her chin in his hand to get a closer look at the bruise on her cheek.

She shrugged, but didn’t try to wrest herself free of his grip. “Some lowlife on the subway tried to get fresh with a girl clearly too young to even be drinking, and he didn’t like the word no. I explained to him the error of his ways. No biggie.”

“Darce,” Steve frowned, “you should have called the authorities.”

“What were you even doing on the subway?” Stark demanded.

“I do sometimes like to eat outside of the Tower, Tony, and I totally did call the authorities, but I wasn’t going to sit there while a high schooler was getting groped.” Darcy did remove herself from Steve’s grip this time.

She took one look at both Steve and Stark in towels, smirked, shrugged, and then tossed them each a set of clothes.

“Jarvis! Why didn’t we hear about this?” Stark inquired as he turned around to get dressed.

“I was not monitoring police activity of that nature, Sir.” Jarvis sounded apologetic.

“Dude, chill. It’s not Jarvis’ job to report all sexual harassment charges in New York. He wouldn’t have enough hours in the day.” Darcy objected.

None of them seemed mollified by that statement.

Darcy groaned. “You guys are ridiculous. I’m fine, okay. Unlike Barnes. Look at him, he looks so uncomfortable like that, my shoulder aches in sympathy.”

Steve looked at him and grimaced before turning back to Darcy. “No more fighting, or I’ll sic Natasha on you.”

“Please, like that’s a hardship.” She scoffed. She turned and left before anyone could comment further.

Barnes shook his head. “She reminds me of you, Punk.”

“Don’t start.”

He chuckled. Despite his dislike of seeing any form of injury on Darcy’s fair skin, he had to admit, at least to himself, that he liked her spirit. It really did remind him of Steve, and that wasn’t wholly a bad thing.

“I think I see the problem.” Stark directed his focus back to the task at hand, and had the arm functioning again in less than an hour. When it was done, he told Barnes to come to him any time he needed help with it, and that if he was interested, he could make some modifications and improvements.

“I’ll think about it.” Barnes dismissed. He wasn’t keen on the idea, but he might change his mind. One day. “I’m headed up to my place,” he deflected before Stark could try to wheedle him into saying yes. “You two… talk.”

_____

The first Avengers emergency since Barnes’ return happened that evening just as dinner went on the table. The alarm sounded and the team lept to their feet, racing to the elevator to get suited up. Darcy and Jane sighed, but collected the food and placed it in tupperware for when they returned.

It was as she was placing the rolls on the cooling rack with the pie for dessert that Barnes came into the room, clearly uncertain as to what he should be doing.

He still hadn’t spoken to her, was still avoiding her, but in the moments he had acknowledged her, he was never rude (unless you count the not talking). She’d learned the difference between his every-day glower and the one he used when he was actually angry about something, and that look had never been directed her way.

Needless to say, she was still confused by him, but she finally accepted that he’d work out whatever his issue was eventually. Until then, she would be as polite and kind as she was to the others.

“Alarm to assemble.” She explained when he glared at the empty room. “I was about to turn on the TV if you wanted to join… I like to keep an eye on them when possible.”

She didn’t know why Barnes wasn’t out there with them. Maybe they hadn’t decided whether or not he was field ready; maybe he didn’t want to be an Avenger. Regardless, he reluctantly nodded, and sat on the couch. She was about to join him before thinking better of it. She grabbed the pie, two forks, and then wandered over and sat next to him. She set the pie on the knee closest to him, stuck a fork on his side of the pie, before digging in with her own fork. After a couple of seconds, he reached for the fork and began to eat with her.

The TV turned to a news broadcast with a live feed. It was some distance from the fight itself, but it was enough for them to see the gist of what was happening. A figure in cape the color of highlighter orange (sorta like he’d pieced it together from construction worker’s visibility vests) was flying around 42nd street on a glider shooting up the street below. The vantage point of the camera had to be a helicopter because it was above the asshole and caught clearly the damage he was doing to cars, buildings, and even people.

“Dick.” Darcy grumbled.

The Avengers arrived in groups. Iron Man and Thor were first on the scene and immediately gave the villain something else to shoot at. Captain America and Black Widow (and presumably Hawkeye, though she couldn’t see him) were next and they started evacuation and rescue of people trapped by debris and fire. The Hulk hadn’t made an appearance, but they tried to avoid letting the big guy out unless they really needed him. Collateral damage always went up when the Hulk came to the party.

With the arrival of the Avengers, the dude on the glider upped the ante. He’d clearly been saving a few tricks for when the heroes arrived because now he multiplied. There were suddenly a dozen flying assholes and they were putting up a much harder fight than they should have. Evidence of Hawkeye’s presence became clear when one of the duplicates fell to earth with an arrow in his shoulder. Thor zapped a pair of them with lightning, Captain America’s shield knocked another off its glider, Iron Man destroyed three gliders in quick succession, but for every duplicate incapacitated, another appeared, and the Avengers weren’t slowing down his reign of destruction.

“It’s three card Monty.” Darcy murmured, glaring at the TV. “Find the red queen to win, but once the cards start moving she’s no longer on the board.”

Barnes was out of his seat the second she finished her thought. “Jarvis, can you get a message to Hawkeye?”

“Of course, Sgt. Barnes.”

He made his way to the elevator before he turned and gave Darcy a nod. Then the doors opened and he was gone.

Smiling, she turned back to the TV and went for another forkful of pie. When she connected with pie pan rather than delicious flakey goodness, she looked down to see that Barnes had eaten the whole thing without her even noticing. She rolled her eyes and set the pan on the coffee table.

She never did see Barnes on the TV, but eventually, while the others kept playing with the duplicates, a window on the north side of the street shattered and out came the original caped asshole. The duplicates vanished, and Iron Man caught him before he landed saluting the window he’d just fallen from.

Darcy grinned and already had her tablet at the ready. She composed a few choice posts for Twitter and a longer, more thorough post for the official Avengers blog before setting the tablet aside.

The team arrived just as Darcy finished setting the table (again) and they tucked into their meal with gusto. Barnes even sat at the table with them, much to everyone’s surprise, and joined in on dinner.

“Where’s the pie?” Barton demanded upon seeing the empty cooling rack.

Darcy looked pointedly at Barnes who just shrugged one shoulder, smirking without a shred of remorse.

When dinner was over and the team made their way to showers and other post-avenging activities, Barnes stayed behind to help her with clean-up. She smiled at him gratefully as he helped her collect the dishes, and he gave her a small one in return.

He still didn’t say anything though.

Finally, after the dishes were either drying on the rack or in the dishwasher, she turned to him before he could leave. “Whatever your reasons are for avoiding me, this,” she gestured to the room, “was nice. I don’t want to be the reason you don’t hang out with the others.”

He looked at her and then down like he was ashamed.

“You don’t have to talk to me if you don’t want to, but come to dinners, okay?”

She didn’t give him the chance to say anything, not that she thought he would, and went back to her room to finish up a bit of work. Now that enough time had passed for official reports to be broadcast, she was eager to respond to comments and retweets.

There seemed to be some speculation as to who ultimately caught the bad guy, and Darcy was more than happy to inform the world that it had been Barnes, working cooperatively with the others as a part of the team. There was a flurry of responses to that, but most of them were good. It was encouraging to see the people want Barnes to be on the side of good. A redemption story was always a crowd pleaser, it seemed. There were people, of course, who tried to paint him in a bad light. Darcy had resigned herself to this fact long ago, because it was inevitable and she couldn’t please everyone, but that’s why she had acceptable ranges that she strived for instead.

She went to sleep content with the way the day had gone.

____

The glider from the attack yesterday sat in Stark’s lab awaiting a full diagnostic. Barnes had gotten a close look at it when he tracked down its rider, and he couldn’t shake the feeling that something about it was familiar. He made his way to Stark’s lab to take another look at it, and Steve gladly followed him down.

Steve dragged Stark away from working when they arrived, ostensibly to talk about the glider, but Barnes figured Steve was probably more interested in talking about the soulmate revelation than the hunk of sophisticated metal currently hovering quietly in the lab. Barnes, however, got up close and personal with the thing, trying to determine why it seemed familiar. He examined it for the better part of twenty minutes before he realized he couldn’t hear Steve or Stark anymore.

When he looked up, he found both of them staring at him. Stark looked curious, and Steve looked like he wasn’t sure whether or not to be concerned, but neither one stopped him from doing what he was doing.

“What do you think?” Stark asked finally.

“It feels… familiar, but I don’t know why.” Barnes confessed.

Stark flashed his eyebrows up in brief surprise, and muttered. “Interesting. Is it Hydra, you think?”

“Maybe.” Barnes glared at the thing on principle.

“None of the Hydra files leaked mentioned something like this.” Steve pointed out. “Maybe you saw it elsewhere? On a mission?”

Barnes shrugged. He honestly didn’t know. There were still gray areas in his memory from his time as the Soldier, and he counted his blessings every day that that was true, but it didn’t feel like the device itself was familiar, just... something about it.

“I believe I can be of assistance.” Jarvis declared.

“What have you got?” Stark joined Barnes by the glider.

“When Sgt. Barnes suggested the glider was familiar, I began to cross reference the files we have regarding the Winter Soldier with what we’ve been able to learn of the glider. The files list only a name, but I believe that the creator of the glider is the same man who created the current model of Sgt. Barnes’ cybernetic arm.” Jarvis explained.

Barnes took an instinctive step back from the thing. “What?”

“The guy we took out yesterday?” Stark looked puzzled.

“No.” Barnes shook his head. “It wasn’t him. Him I would have recognized.” Probably.

“Sgt. Barnes is correct. The man arrested yesterday was identified as Nicholas Cana, and he has no known ties with Hydra. However it is possible he acquired the glider from another source.”

“What makes you think they’re the same then?” Barnes asked.

Stark made a noise of comprehension. “Similarities in how they’re made. Design elements, tools used, materials…”

“Like with art.” Steve tried. “Though the pieces may be completely different, you can tell the same hand crafted them.”

“Precisely.” Jarvis agreed. “This similarity is likely what you were recognizing, Sgt. Barnes.”

Barnes continued to glare at it. “Great. How did he get it?”

“Let’s ask him.” Captain America suggested.

“One moment.” Jarvis requested. There was a pause, and then, “It appears that Mr. Cana has thus far refused to cooperate with authorities; the police do not believe he will answer your questions.”

“Tell them that we’d like to try anyway. I’ll head over with Natasha; Tony, see what you can dig up in his recent activity. Do what you can without breaking any laws, but we need to know when, where, and who he bought it from.”

“On it.” Stark got to work as Barnes and Steve left the lab.

“What can I do?” Barnes asked.

“You’ve done it.” Steve assured. “You gave us the lead; for now, wait here with the others.”

It felt like being left behind, but Barnes agreed. Taking the Winter Soldier in to interrogate a suspect would probably not look good, and there wasn’t much more to do than that until they had more to go on. Resigned, he made his way to the gym. He had to wait for Steve to come back, but that didn’t mean he had to be idle. He had some aggression he needed to work out of his system anyway.

He was on his third punching bag when the alarm to assemble went off.

“Jarvis?”

“There appears to be an incident occurring in Brooklyn.” The AI informed him. “Agent Barton requests you accompany the team, if you’re so inclined.”

“Tell him I’m suiting up.” Barnes ran for the locker room. The tactical gear he’d normally wear as the Soldier was efficient and he’d kept it when he moved into the Tower. Clint had made a comment about it at one point being a little on the intimidating side, but he didn’t particularly care. It worked, and it’s what he had.

He met Hawkeye, Thor, and Banner in the hangar. Presumably Iron Man was already en route. They greeted him easily and boarded the quinjet.

“Tasha and Steve are still at the police station, and we can’t wait for them. They’ll meet us when they can.” Hawkeye informed him as he began the start up sequence. “However, that leaves us without Steve’s tactical mind until he does arrive. Think you can pick up the slack?”

“Me?” Barnes fit the earpiece Banner handed him into his ear.

Thor gave him a hearty clap on the shoulder. “Aye, you possess a tactical mind much like that of the Captain. Our trust is not misplaced.”

Barnes allowed that, though Steve was miles ahead of him in that department. He’d been second in command with the Commandos, but he did not expect anything of the sort with the Avengers, and part of him felt like this was a test or a trap.

“What about you Stark?” Barnes asked.

“Team sports aren’t really my forte.”

“Fine.” He squared his shoulders. If they wanted him to call the shots, he would. Until Steve arrived to take over anyway. “Iron Man, I need eyes on scene. Give me a rundown.”

“On it.”

____

Darcy watched as she always did from the TV in the Tower. The flavor of the day was a trio of douchebags sporting exo-suits. Nothing as sophisticated as Iron Man, but effective enough to deal some major property damage. They were targeting the Brooklyn Bridge, of all things, and doing a decent job of wrecking it.

It didn’t take long for the Iron Man to arrive. He tried taking out one of the suits, but it released a smokescreen making it impossible for safe targeting so long as there so many civilians still in the area. The quinjet arrived not long after, and the team was able to keep the assailants from doing more harm. Thor spent most of his time getting people out of danger, those still trapped in cars or blocked from escape by debris. Iron Man, Hawkeye, and the Winter Soldier each took an attacker, separating them, and forcing them to work on their own. It was effective. Unable to rely on each other for assistance, the attackers were pitted one on one against people with training and practice. Their exo-suits offered them some advantage, but it was only enough to keep the fight going. When Captain America and Black Widow arrived, it was all over.

Darcy was furiously typing away at her tablet the entire fight, readying the usual press release. When the fight wrapped up and the three men were removed from their exo-suits and handed over to the waiting authorities, Darcy coordinated with Pepper in regard to Stark’s fund for repairs to the damaged infrastructure and then sent the press release out to the major networks, most of whom were already asking for statements.

She was very good at her job.

Darcy set the tablet aside and began a batch of cookies. Positive reinforcement and all that.

“Are they okay?” Jane’s voice distracted her only momentarily.

Darcy smiled brightly. “Of course. Cut and blonde did a lot of rescue work, lifting cars, and all that. Most of the actual fighting was Clint, Tony, and Barnes.”

“Good.” Jane smiled. She’d been buried in Science when the alarm went off, and Darcy was glad she hadn’t dropped everything to agonize over Thor and the others. The last time she’d done that, she’d nearly set the lab on fire.

Darcy motioned to the tablet, “The press release is there if you wanna read it.”

“Pass. I know you know what you’re doing.” Jane gave her a one-armed hug, and Darcy gave her a spoonful of cookie dough.

The team arrived shortly after Jane returned to the lab, significantly more grumpy looking than Darcy felt was really called for considering. “What did I miss?”

“Oh nothing, just your standard black market weapons dealing.” Tony fumed.

Darcy looked to Tony, concerned. “More Stark tech…?”

“Hydra.” Steve corrected.

Darcy blinked. “Okay. Should I…” She edged toward her tablet.

“I’d like to resolve the issue without causing a public panic.” Steve rubbed a hand over his face, weary.

“Sure.” Darcy shrugged. She was fairly confident she could write up something that wouldn’t cause a panic, but she wasn’t going to argue with Captain America.

“Sorry Darce.”

She waved him off. “You’re the Captain.”

The cookies went in the oven, she set the timer, and then plopped herself down in front of the TV to monitor the news stories on the event. Behind her she heard the sound of someone getting hit, and then, “Nice going, Punk.”

Darcy suppressed a smile and focused on doing her job. The networks were quoting her press release and hailing the Avengers in their swift action to once again help the city. It was good coverage, and Darcy was satisfied with it. As she watched, she penned out a few drafts for a release about the Hydra weapon deals. Steve didn’t want to cause a panic, and neither did Darcy, but it would probably come out eventually, and she wanted to be ready when it did.

The team had scattered for standard post-mission rituals, so Darcy was able to take the cookies out of the oven without hassle once the buzzer went off. She set them to cool on the rack and then made her way down to Tony’s lab. If there was tech recovered (and she assumed there was) it would be in the lab.

“So… this is a Hydra weapon?” Darcy looked at the exo-suit with disdain.

“Yep.” Tony was scanning and tinkering.

She looked it over. “Seems… unoriginal.”

Tony chortled. “My thoughts exactly.”

“I assume it’s more than what it seems?” Darcy gestured, unimpressed look on her face.

“It’s Hydra; I’m not assuming anything at this point.” Tony grumbled. “Jarvis is running a full diagnostic, but for now… I’m more interested in how they got it.”

“Right. Black Market dealer.” Darcy remembered. “Anything I can do?”

“Cap’s right, at this point telling people would do more harm than good.” Tony shook his head. “Don’t look at me like that, I can agree with Stars and Stripes on occasion.”

“Uh huh.” She glanced around the lab, for lack of anything else to do and noticed the Iron Man suit being inspected by a couple of robots. It looked a little dinged up, but not the worst it had ever been. “Two in as many days. When’s the last time that happened?”

“Never as far as I can remember.” Tony agreed.

“Is it connected?”

“The suits and the glider are both Hydra created, yeah, but the idiots using them don’t have any connections that we’ve found.”

“Other than suddenly having high-tech gear they used to wreck shit.” Darcy added.

“Obviously.”

“And you don’t think this is worth mentioning to the public?” Darcy questioned. “If some deal went down, some big sale or whatever, what’s to say tomorrow there won’t be another attack? Shouldn’t we warn people?”

“What do you propose, Lewis? Shut down the city?” Tony eyed her. “For how long? We don’t have a lead yet as to who did this, where it happened, or even how much tech got sold. People can’t hide in their homes forever while we sort this out.”

“Twenty-three, Stark.” Darcy snapped. “That’s how many died yesterday on Broadway; the numbers aren’t in yet for what happened today, but I’m going to guess it’s higher. People have the right to know something is up.”

“And we’ll tell them as soon as we know what’s up.” Tony objected. “At the moment we don’t actually know for sure.”

“We know more than they do! Once is a fluke, twice is coincidence, three times is a pattern. If we get attacked tomorrow, they’re going to see a pattern, and then we will get questions demanding to know why we didn’t tell them that they were in danger.”

“That assumes we get hit tomorrow.”

Darcy groaned in frustration. “Don’t be obstinate; you of all people should know how the media can turn.”

“You of all people should know that I don’t care.” Tony snorted.

She stormed out of the lab, unwilling to argue with him about it. Darcy relocated herself to Jane’s lab and worked for the next three hours on press releases for when shit hit the fan. Grumbling to herself on Jane’s couch, tablet in hand, was how Natasha found her.

The spy grabbed her attention by quietly clearing her throat.

“Hey.”

“You’re annoyed.”

“Yep.”

Natasha considered her a moment. “Tea?”

Darcy put her tablet down, “Yes, please.”

The two left the lab for Natasha’s apartment. It was a charming combination of subtle colors, just the barest hint of frippery, and quiet classical music that had initially surprised Darcy, but she’d grown used to it the more time she spent with Natasha. The two enjoyed an exclusive tea party setting when they could, and it was nice to be able to decompress with Natasha because she knew that she could be honest and not have her opinions or feelings shared with the others. Natasha was anything but a gossip. She hoped that Natasha got something similar out of it.

“Do you wish to talk about it?” Natasha asked as she poured the tea, switching to her native Russian as was customary for their tea parties. Natasha was the only one who knew she was fluent in the language.

“I know there are pros and cons to telling the public everything;” she began in the same language, “normally I agree with Steve’s judgement as to when the cons outweigh the pros, but this time…? I don’t know, Tasha. I think they have a right to know they’re in danger, but Steve and Tony both think it would do more harm than good.”

Natasha added honey and milk to Darcy’s tea before handing it to her. “What have they told you about what’s happened?”

“It’s Hydra tech getting into the hands of people without Hydra ties.” Darcy sighed. “They think it’s a black market thing.”

“They did not tell you the important part.” Natasha prepared her own tea before finishing the thought. “The technology was designed by the same person, and this inventor is the same man who created James’ arm.”

Darcy took a sip of her tea as she thought about that. Various tech getting created and sold could simply be fallout from the info dump last year; there was a lot of information to sift through and there was every chance that the dangerous stuff (like Hydra R&D) had gotten into the wrong hands before Tony and the government had been able to get to all of it. But tech all from the same creator, especially that creator, could imply something else. As much information as there had been on the Winter Soldier, there was surprisingly little in regard to the arm. The man himself must be responsible for the black market sales, and he was out there, somewhere, making more evil tech.

Natasha simply sipped her tea as she watched Darcy work through the information, content to let her draw her own conclusions.

“Is Barnes in danger?” Darcy asked.

Natasha tilted her head a little in acknowledgement. “We shouldn’t rule it out as a possibility.”

“Do you think the public should be warned?”

“It’s not up to me.” Natasha declined.

“But you have an opinion, one I value.” Darcy insisted.

Natasha smirked. “More than that of the Captain?”

Darcy huffed.

“You are not looking for my opinion. You are looking for someone to tell you to do what you wish.” Natasha told her kindly.

“Worth a try.” Darcy sighed.

“Ultimately it is your choice whether or not to release the information, and there is very little the others can do to stop you.” Natasha pointed out calmly.

True. If she really wanted to, she could go against their wishes and release the information. “I could, yeah, but that feels… wrong, somehow.”

“Every choice--action or inaction--has consequences. Steve knows this, as does Tony. They also have experience that you don’t, but the same is true of you.” Natasha smiled indulgently. “If you see something they don’t, a danger they have not yet realized, then you should speak to them about it.”

Darcy finished her tea as she thought it over.

“Sorry to interrupt,” Jarvis interjected, “but there appears to be a security breach.”

“What’s happened?” Natasha was on her feet in less than a second, speaking english once more.

“Unknown.” If an AI couldn’t sound surprised, Jarvis did an awfully good impression. “I am picking up anomalies on multiple levels, but I have not yet pinpointed the source.”

“Where?”

“The labs--”

“Jane!” Darcy shot to her feet, but a strong grip on her shoulder kept her from running off like she wanted.

Natasha gave her sharp look. “Jarvis?”

“I’ve picked up anomalies on both the lab and residential levels.”

“How did they get past you?” Darcy challenged.

“Unknown, though if you find out, do inform me.” Jarvis drawled sardonically.

Natasha pulled her along, out the door, and toward the stairs. “Which residential levels?”

“All of them.”

She drew a gun from somewhere and steered Darcy into the stairwell. “Don’t do anything foolish.”

“Rude.”

“Natalia, status.” Barnes jumped from the flight below them making Darcy jump.

“Annoyed. Is the stairwell clear?” Natasha demanded.

“It is for the moment.” Jarvis answered.

“Go to the lab, find Jane, and wait in the panic room.” Natasha instructed.

Darcy didn’t argue. She flew down the stairs as fast as she could go and raced to Jane’s lab. It was five floors down, but adrenaline was one hell of a boost. She made it in record time (not that she’d ever actually timed it) and burst into the lab. The minions Jane had working for her were absent, which wasn’t unusual since it was well after work hours, but the astrophysicist was still there. Jane appeared to be trying to get to the panic room intended for just this purpose, but something was slowing her down. As Darcy got closer, she saw roughly seven little robots scurrying about the wall. They kept moving so it was hard to get an accurate count.

Darcy grabbed the fire extinguisher on the wall by the stairs, pulled the pin, and ran over. “Jane, move!”

Jane took instruction well in a crisis. She scampered back away from the panic room door and let Darcy by. Darcy then aimed the nozzle and sprayed the little fuckers with super chilled foam. It wasn’t enough to stop them completely, but it slowed them down long enough for Darcy to smash a couple with the butt of the extinguisher. She kicked the button for the door and covered Jane as she ran in. Darcy gave the robots another blast, covering the doorframe in foam in the process, and dashed inside while they lost their footing on the wall. The door slammed shut behind her, and Darcy all but dropped the extinguisher as soon as it was sealed.

“You okay?”

Jane hugged her. “Am I okay? You’re ridiculous, you know that right?”

“Whatever, you’da done the same for me.” Darcy huffed, a little out of breath now that the adrenaline was wearing off. “What the hell are those things anyway?”

“Mechanical bugs of some kind.” Jane said. “Didn’t even know they were there until I felt one of them climb on me.”

Darcy immediately grabbed Jane and gave her a thorough head to toe inspection for damage or anything odd. Jane complained, but Darcy told her to stop fidgeting and let her look, just in case. She wasn’t hurt, but Darcy did find something in the cuff of her jeans. It looked like a listening device or something equally spy-ish. She dropped it and crushed it beneath the fire extinguisher.

The resulting explosion of gas made Darcy question her initial assessment of the device’s purpose. For about .3 seconds, and then all she could think about was how it was getting really hard to breathe.

“Darcy!” Jane shrieked.

Darcy tried to wave her off, but her limbs didn’t seem to want to cooperate any more than her lungs. She fell to the ground.

Jane’s face appeared in her field of vision, frantic and worried. “Darcy, can you hear me? Jarvis, what the hell happened?”

All Darcy could manage were wheezing gasps, until finally, not even that. Her lungs refused to pull in more air, the edges of her vision were going black, and Darcy couldn’t even express the amount of panic she was in because her limbs weren’t working anymore either.

Jane rolled her onto her back. “I’m starting CPR.”

“Dr. Foster, I cannot recommend that.”

“She’s dying!”

“But not dead. Performing CPR will do more harm than good until her heart stops. Also, the paralytic may still be in her airway, if you attempt to perform CPR, you will be affected as well and then you will both perish.”

The pounding of Darcy’s heart became louder than the world around her, and it didn’t take long for her to lose consciousness completely.

When Darcy woke up, she noticed a few things. One, her chest hurt like a she’d been hit by a truck; two, her head hurt like the same truck had then backed up to finish the job; and three someone nearby was having quite an argument. In Russian.

“--somewhere safe!”

“The panic rooms are the safest in the building.” That was Natasha, she recognized Natasha’s voice.

“Obviously not!”

The sound of someone getting hit, followed by, “If you’re so distressed, maybe you should talk to her.”

There was silence save for the beeping from machines nearby, and it lulled her back into sleep.

The next time she woke up, Jane had a death grip on her hand, head pillowed on Darcy’s legs fast asleep. She gently nudged her as best she could. “Jane?”

Her friend was up in an instant, confused briefly as to what woke her, and then her attention was on Darcy. “You’re up!”

“Color me surprised.” Her voice was rough and it hurt a little to talk, but it hurt even worse to cough. “Christ on a cracker, what,” more coughing, “happened?”

“You died, is what.” Jane slapped her on the shoulder, glaring.

“Ow.”

The angry expression slipped off her face instantly and she shifted into tears. Thor stood from where he’d been sitting near the foot of the bed and wrapped Jane to his side in a gentle hug. “You had us all quite worried, little one.”

Darcy frowned. “I died?”

“Aye. Jarvis summoned me with great haste, and I followed my Lady Jane’s instructions how to revive you. To my immense shame, I injured you in the process.” He handed her a cup of water with a straw.

She drank what she could. “Don’t sweat it big guy. Broken ribs are way better than death.”

Thor smiled weakly. “I should have been more careful.”

“If you’re careful, you’re not doing it right.” Clint said as he and the rest of the team walked in.

Darcy managed a wave and a smile/grimace.

“Glad to see you awake, Darce.” Steve gave her a brilliant smile.

“Short Stack, what have I told you about destroying murder robots?” Tony leaned casually against a counter, mostly out of the way of the rest of them, frowning at her over a hologram his tablet was rendering of the device she’d destroyed.

“Nothing.” Darcy stuck her tongue out at him.

He bristled. “I think ‘Don’t’ was implied pretty heavily during your orientation.”

“I thought it was a listening bug,” she grimaced adjusting herself so she could see everyone better. Jane helped her by propping the bed up. “Like I know the difference? I’m just a civilian.”

“Штатский моя задница, you're as bad as Steve." Barnes snapped. Everyone turned to look at him, and, to Darcy’s endless amusement, he looked as surprised as the rest of them that he’d said anything at all. He rubbed his metal hand over his face, “Черт возьми.”

Then what he’d said caught up to her. “I knew it!” She threw her cup at him, and immediately regretted it as her ribs flared in agony. “Sonovabitch.”

There was a ruckus as the occupants of the room went from amused to confused to worried and a little angry. Jane edged her back onto the bed gently, making quiet shushing noises to calm her down; Thor took a step between Barnes and Darcy, though he looked torn as to what to do next; Steve looked, at once, ready to laugh at and smack Barnes; Natasha had no such restraint and walloped him upside the head; Clint and Tony just looked confused as hell.

Barnes looked resigned, and a little defeated.

“You,” she was panting, but she didn’t care, “knew, you had to know. Why did you-- what possessed you to-- ugh!” She couldn’t form a coherent thought together long enough to chew him out.

She’d known (or at least suspected heavily) that Barnes was her soulmate. There were only so many people in her life that spoke Russian and knew a Steve. It wasn’t Natasha, so the odds were in her favor that it was gonna be Barnes. The fact that he hadn’t said a single word to her since his arrival at the Tower and his initial avoidance had been off putting, to say the least, and more than a little hurtful considering her suspicions, but he’d gotten better! After the sharing the couch and eating the pie and helping with the dishes, she really thought they were making progress.

And yes, objectively, she knew that his first words weren’t going to be something, ya know, romantic or anything, but still. Months of absolutely nothing was enough to make her believe that, maybe, just maybe, he knew who she was, and he didn’t want her to be his soulmate. That that was why he’d been avoiding her.

That thought had hurt. A lot. Rejection was one thing, but being rejected by your own soulmate? When the person destined by the heavens to be your other half wanted nothing to do with you? Yeah, that was a kick in the teeth.

She’d learned Russian for him!

To her utter shame, she realized she was crying when Jane cooed and wiped the tears from her face. “Don’t worry Darce, he’s gone; it’s okay.”

“No, it’s not.” She sniffed. “Look.”

She moved to raise the sleeve of her shirt before realizing she wasn’t wearing it, just the standard issue hospital gown. Instead, she thrust her left arm at Jane to look at. She’d always been protective of her Words, always covered them because she liked the idea of her soulmate being… hers, and the Words were her way of holding on to that, keeping them all to herself, until he (or she) found her.

Jane looked, face registering shock, before looking back to Darcy’s face. She gave her a watery at best smile and stroked her hair. “That’s supposed to be good news, isn’t it?”

“He doesn’t want me. He’s known for months, and this, here, now, is when he chooses to speak.” Darcy lamented.

“Get some rest, okay?” Jane kissed her forehead. “Everything will work itself out. I promise.”

Darcy was fighting sleep, wanted to tell her not to make promises she couldn’t keep, but sleep won before she could make her mouth form the words.

___

In the first few moments after Darcy’s outburst, there was a growing hostility coming from the Avengers. Steve pulled him out the door, and everyone followed except Jane who stayed with Darcy. The hallway was crowded, the energy coming off the men now glaring him down was making the Soldier edge close to the foreground of his mind, a place he hadn’t been for months, and Barnes fought it for the moment, but if someone made a move to attack, he wasn’t certain he would be able to restrain that part of himself.

Thankfully, Steve intervened before it came to blows. “I think we all need to take a breath, and calm down. This isn’t… as bad as it looks.”

A brief argument broke out between Steve, Clint, and Stark as to what exactly just happened. Barnes would have liked to interject, but no one was giving him the opportunity.

“You should have said something sooner.” Natalia chastised him in her native tongue. “Her distress will not aid her healing.”

“I didn’t want to cause her distress, that’s why I didn’t say anything.” Barnes retorted, easily slipping into the familiar language. Only himself and Natalia spoke it with fluency, so he felt safe that no one else would overhear/understand the conversation. “Hearing she was dead, seeing her injured… it just slipped out.”

Natalia gave him a scrutinizing look, “You care for her?”

“Of course I care, she’s my soulmate.” Barnes snapped.

A large hand was suddenly on his shoulder. He looked up to see that it was attached to Thor. A smiling Thor. Not what he expected to see. “Friend Barnes, this is joyous news! The fulfillment of a Soul Bond is cause for celebration.”

Thor was not speaking Russian. Did Thor know Russian? Barnes looked to Natalia who had a smug smile on her face. She set him up, Barnes thought. Not the first time, a part of himself scolded.

“Say what?” Stark sidestepped Steve entirely, who up to this point had been hedging around the relevant information in deference to Barnes.

All eyes were on him.

“Darcy has my Words.” Barnes revealed with reluctance.

Not everyone was as enthused as Thor. Clint for one. The archer frowned, then, as if the last few pieces fell in place, he looked like he finally understood a mystery that had been eluding him for some time.

“That’s why she kept messing with her sleeve around Steve.” Clint mumbled. “Oh for the… she had to guess.”

“She did.” Natalia nodded.

“Well, uh… huh.” Stark seemed to be at slight loss for words, which was new, but Barnes didn’t stick around to enjoy it.

He slipped away and made it as far as the door to Darcy’s room before he was stopped, although not by any of the Avengers. Jane, Darcy’s friend, nearly bumped into him on his way passed. He sidestepped her so they wouldn’t collide, but she didn’t let him escape, firm hand on the doorframe blocking his egress.

“You should talk to her when she wakes up.” She suggested. “Cat’s out of the bag now, there’s no reason the two of you can’t have a conversation like adults.”

What would he say? Sorry you’re stuck with me? I wish you could have had anyone else’s Words? “She’s smart enough to know what I’d say. She doesn’t need to hear it.”

The somewhat pleasant look on Jane’s face slipped into one of frustration. “The answer could be clear as fucking day and she’d still deserve to hear it.”

He could hear Thor approaching. “Let me by, Jane Foster. I’ve made enough mistakes for one lifetime, I do not want to add to the list.” He gave her one of his better glares in hopes of encouraging her to move. When she did, he left the hallway, the others, and Darcy behind.

He made a quick retreat to his room to grab the bug out bag he kept stashed before leaving the Tower. He took Steve’s bike because it was fast and he knew where the keys were. It wasn’t long before he was out of Manhattan, but with no real direction to go, he stopped before leaving Brooklyn.

A motel near the edge of the city had a room he could afford with the cash from the bag and didn’t care when he signed in under a false identity. The room was a sty compared to what he’d had at the Tower, but he adapted. It was part of his training. Adapt, survive.

The GPS on his phone was off (he always kept it off) but he double checked it before setting himself down on the bed. He had to think, needed time to himself to get his thoughts in order.

He knew leaving was the better option; remove himself from the equation and Darcy could move on, accept that there were better people out there for her than him. Ambiguity had been his ally before; if she hadn’t met her soulmate yet, she had the choice of seeking another person for companionship. Now that she knew, not just guessed, but unequivocally knew, it wasn’t enough to simply not talk to her. He had to leave.

Part of him raged at the idea of it though. He didn’t want to leave; he liked living at the Tower with friends, with Steve, and yes, even Darcy. Staying away from her had been hard. She was smart like a whip and clever, not to mention drop dead gorgeous, with a will of iron. He’d followed her work, and she was tenacious. She was everything he looked for in a dame. But nobody--nobody sane--would find anything in him worth having. He was a damaged man with a violent past and enough blood on his hands to drown in.

He had to leave, but, a traitorous part of him said, he didn’t have to go far. He knew how to stay under the radar; no one would know he was nearby. Darcy would be able to move on without him around, but he could keep an eye on her. He’d meant what he said: she was as bad as Steve. Maybe a personal shadow wasn’t such a bad idea. A little creepy? Yes. He was civilized enough to recognize that it was creepy, but if it meant keeping Darcy safe--even from himself--then that’s what he would do.

Course of action decided, Barnes sent a text to Steve with a time and location to meet him tomorrow. If the meeting went well, Barnes would be willing to continue to work with the Avengers if they needed him, and if it didn’t go well… well, Steve needed his bike back at the very least.

Steve met him at the cafe like he’d asked, alone, which was a blessing he hoped for but hadn’t expected. When he’d sat down and had his coffee in front of him, Barnes sat across from Steve and placed the keys to the bike in the middle of the table.

“Jerk.” Steve scooped up the keys.

Barnes smirked. “Needed some air.”

“And now?” Steve eyed their surroundings meaningfully.

“I’m not what she wants, Stevie.” Barnes shook his head. “I can’t be. It’s better if I’m out here; give her some space.”

“Shouldn’t you let her decide that?”

Barnes shrugged. “I ain’t what I used to be; Bucky may have been worthy of her, but I’m not him.”

Steve sat back in his chair. “No one’s telling you you have to be.”

Barnes glowered at him a little.

“People change, Buck. I couldn’t expect you to be the same man you were before the war any more than you could expect me to be. Even without the serum.” Steve corrected him. “You’re still James Buchanan Barnes, my best friend since we were kids, and the biggest jerk I know no matter how much else is different.”

He shook his head again. “Still not enough. I gotta do what’s right, and that means letting her choose someone better, which will be a hell of a lot easier if I’m gone, but I wasn’t lyin’. She’s as bad as you about finding trouble. I want you to… keep an eye on her for me. Make sure she’s safe.”

“I’d have done that with or without you asking.” Steve informed him. “She’s my friend, remember.”

“Good.” Barnes nodded.

“What about the others?” Steve asked. “You giving up being an Avenger?”

“I’m not--”

“Yeah you are.” Steve insisted.

Barnes huffed. “I helped a couple times. That doesn’t make me an Avenger.”

“I’m team captain, I decide who’s on the team.” Steve contended.

“Punk.” Barnes rolled his eyes. “Fine. If you need me, I’m not going far. Just… outta the Tower.”

Steve smiled like that was exactly what he wanted to hear. “Good. I’ll have Jarvis notify you when the call goes out, but,” he adopted a more serious face, “I don’t want emergencies to be the only time I see you.”

“Like I said,” Barnes stood, leaving a few notes on the table to pay for Steve’s coffee, “I ain’t going far.”

He saluted Steve sarcastically and walked back the way he came, content with the plan he’d put in place. Steve would be able to keep a close eye on Darcy, and he’d be able to do his own shadowing from afar. It was the best he could do, and it would have to be enough until…

He shut down that voice in his head telling him that once he’d proven himself to be worthy, he could return.

___

Darcy was assigned six weeks of light duty until her ribs fully healed. Darcy felt pretty sure she’d go completely insane before the end of the first week, but she smiled and nodded so that the doctors would let her go home. She had no intention of taking that much time off, not that she believed the universe would even let her try. It had a wonderful game of Screw Darcy going and she felt like it would be quitting while it was ahead to throw her a soft ball now.

Begrudgingly, she did take the prescription pain meds the doctor handed her. They tended to make her loopy and destroyed what little brain to mouth filter she had, so it wasn’t the best idea to take them and then try to do her job. She vowed to only take them at night when it was time to sleep.

Before she was released, she found out that she’d been recuperating for the better part of three days. In that time, there had been another call to assemble, another asshat using purchased tech to wreck havoc, and no further leads to finding the seller. Oh. and that Barnes had up and left the Tower.

Despite the fact that the black market sale of Hydra tech was the reason she’d wound up in the hospital, it was that last one that actually pissed her off the most. Go figure.

She did her job though. Personal feelings were not adequate excuses to stop doing her job to the best of her ability. Besides, just because he didn’t want to be her soulmate, didn’t mean he was a Bad Guy. It just made him a dick. Tony was a dick and she still defended him to the public.

Thankfully (maybe?), Barnes didn’t quit the Avengers when he moved out. She still had ample fodder for debates trying to decide if he was good or evil, and it was good that Steve still had his friend. She’d meant it when she told Barnes that she didn’t want to be the reason he didn’t hang out with the team.

It hurt though. She’d cried herself to sleep for a solid week because the rejection hurt, and it wasn’t a hurt that the pills could take away. They just made it so she didn’t pass out from physical pain while crying her eyes out.

The rapid fire attacks slowed during that week. They went from one or two a day to every other day to even less as the week dragged into the next. The damage was never Chitauri Invasion level, and while there were still casualties, the population seemed to get the idea that going out and about beyond what was necessary maybe wasn’t the smartest idea. She admitted to Steve and Tony that she may have been too eager to divulge the whole story to the public, but they were gracious about it. Steve even authorized her to release a statement assuring the public that the Avengers were actively working every lead to find the source of the trouble, but she wasn’t to name Hydra. When she asked, Steve explained that if people wanted to get their hands on this tech, he didn’t want to be a finger pointing them in the right direction.

By week four, she was getting stir crazy. She hadn’t been allowed outside the Tower for fear of damaging her ribs or falling under attack and she was sick of it. She needed to go outside. Finally, she broke down and begged Natasha to let her out.

“Throw me a bone! There’s a froyo place just on the corner; let me get froyo.” She clasped her hands together and gave the redhead her best puppydog eyes.

Natasha was unmoved.

Fine. Desperate measures. “I never got my rejection ice cream, Tasha. Please, I need the comfort of sweet, frozen, empty calories.”

For a moment Natasha looked genuinely sad, like she was still upset by Barnes’ behavior, which was entirely possible. Then she sighed. “Fine.”

“Bless you.”

“Not alone.”

Darcy groaned. “My soulmate doesn’t want me; sobbing into my froyo alone sounds about as appealing as tattooing Reject on my forehead. Some girl time is exactly what I want right now.”

“Can’t.” Natasha actually sounded remorseful. “Barton and I have a mission.”

It was then that Darcy noted the Black Widow catsuit that Natasha was wearing. Darcy’s face fell.

“I’ll go.” Steve offered, coming in from the kitchen. Super hearing; he probably heard the entire conversation.

“Even though I might start crying into my froyo? I wasn’t kidding about the crying.” Darcy warned him.

Steve gave her a gentle hug, mindful of her ribs, “Even if you get all snotty and gross.”

She hit him lightly. She wasn’t a pretty crier, but she wasn’t a gross crier, thank you very much. “Thanks.” She added. She was glad of his company.

Businesses around the Tower saw more traffic than the ones further away, so there were a few patrons at the froyo place when Darcy and Steve arrived. Darcy paid them no nevermind, but she saw Steve glance about like he was judging the threat level. She rolled her eyes, but said nothing. If he wanted to be paranoid, she wasn’t going to tell him off. It wouldn’t do any good.

She could do this. Relax with a friend, and not think about Barnes. Contrary to her earlier comment, she didn’t want to cry into her froyo. She’d done a lot of crying and was frankly tired of it.

She convinced him to take a picture because Captain America eating froyo was awesome PR. They enjoyed their frozen treats while Darcy watched the hit count on the picture climb with a smile. Not too long after the original post, someone retweeted with a really nice picture of the two of them sitting at the table. Despite clearly being from one of the patrons, it was a really good picture, so Darcy looked at the pic, looked around the room, and then spotted the culprit. A teenager and someone clearly related but not old enough to be her father. Darcy showed the picture to Steve and then motioned slightly with her head in their direction with a questioning smile.

Steve shrugged and nodded so Darcy waved the two of them over. The girl froze like a deer in the headlights and her brother(?) laughed. With just a little nudging, he managed to get the girl out of her seat and walking their way.

Steve smiled as she approached. “Nice picture.”

“Th-thanks.” The girl stammered.

“What camera did you use?” Darcy wondered. “I need to get me one.”

“Uh, just used my phone, but there’s a few apps that I got to edit and stuff.” She looked ready to vibrate out of the current dimension, but she answered easily enough.

“You’ve got talent.” Steve added.

“Ohmygod, thanks.” She breathed.

Darcy leaned over conspiratorially, “I need more awesome pics like that, but I don’t have the apps yet. You wanna do me a solid and take a pic with Cap, work your magic, and then post it?’

She looked ready to faint at the idea, but nodded. Steve stood up and assumed a standard Photo Op pose with the girl while Darcy took a picture with the girl’s phone. She got the list of apps she used and then sent her back to her brother(?) to finish her froyo and hyperventilate in peace.

Steve and Darcy returned to their own desserts and Darcy managed to keep a positive attitude the entire time. She called it a win.

After that, she made a point of going outside the Tower at least once every three days or so. On the occasions she had one of the Avengers with her rather than Jane, she took at least one photo of them doing something normal. With Clint, it was him making faces at the Muzak playing from the thrift store speakers; Natasha she caught enjoying a well made cup of tea from a coffee shop a block or so from the Tower. She caught a sickeningly sweet moment between Jane and Thor on photo and immediately posted it, not even bothering with her new apps. Tony did ridiculous duck lips upon request so long as she paid him in an equally ridiculous picture of Steve. She obliged with a play on the dog shaming meme. Steve gave his best sad golden retriever impression while holding a sign saying, “I spoiled the twist in Star Wars for myself by knowing German.”

She wanted pictures of Barnes too because including him in these non-Avenging moments was important for his image as one of the team. She brought it up with Steve on one of their outings and he agreed to help her out. The picture he sent her of Barnes making coffee (with one of the bags she’d sent him after he cut his hair) was great for PR, not so great for her emotions though. She cried that night, but that was just between her and Jarvis.

She actually ended up with a lot of pictures of Steve because he ended up being the one to accompany her the most. Not that she minded; it was nice to hang out with him again. She did mind (a little) that images of herself kept creeping up. People who recognized whoever she was with would snap pictures and post them. Some photos were obviously cropped to cut her out, which she appreciated, but some of them weren’t, and she was used to being the one behind the camera.

Also, annoyingly, she most frequently featured in pictures with Steve, and some of the tags people added implied or directly stated that it looked like they were on a date. Steve and Tony were still dancing around each other, testing the waters, such as it were, and weren’t together together yet. They certainly weren’t to the point of admitting to the world that they were soulmates (though Darcy had a whole flowchart ready for that eventual bombshell), and it wasn’t like she could hold the two of them up and go “See look! This is a couple!”

Jane was actually the one to suggest she start dating.

Darcy shot that idea down. “And be the girl who broke Captain America’s heart? No thank you.”

“You aren’t actually together.” Jane reminded her.

“The public seems to think we are.” Darcy groused.

“A couple of pictures and a few people hypothesising, it’s not a deeply rooted opinion.” Jane argued. “Better to do it now rather than later.”

Ugh.

Darcy didn’t want to date. She was still dealing with Barnes’ rejection, and what was she supposed to say when her date asked about her Words? If she got into a serious enough relationship to try being intimate, they would see her Words. She didn’t want to say that he was dead because that seemed a little too much like tempting fate, but saying she hadn’t met him yet tended to put a damper on any real relationship prospects.

“I don’t know.” She murmured, angry at herself for the sadness in her voice.

Jane picked up on her mood easily. She rubbed her shoulders in comfort, “It’s only been a couple months. It’s okay to still be sad.”

Darcy didn’t want to be sad.

Doing something purely for spite, probably wasn’t the best choice, but if she could be angry instead of sad, she would. Anger was better. Anger made her want to move instead of sit in a blanket burrito. So, after a little pre gaming, floating on a tequila tipsy, Darcy declared she was going to a club.

“I’ll go wi--”

“No!” She stopped Steve. “Nope. You will scare away all the dudes. I’m doing the dating thing that Jane suggested. Dating means dudes means no Captain America.”

“I’ll go then.” Natasha offered, giving her a suspicious once over.

“You’ll attract the dudes to you! That’s no good. I need the dudes focused on,” she gestured to herself, “me.”

“You can’t go alone.” Steve objected.

Darcy flapped her hand at him. “Shows what you know.”

“Darce…”

“I am an adult, Steve, and if I want to go to a club and get laid, I can. I don’t need a chaperone.” Darcy retorted. She hit the elevator call button and glared at them all as she left. She hailed a cab and went to a club far enough away from the Tower that she felt herself stop glaring.

Three shots in and Darcy was dancing with anyone who asked. She was hot and sweaty and a little dizzy from the alcohol, but she wasn’t sad. Another four shots and she still found herself turning down offers to be taken home despite her earlier comment to Steve. Random sex wasn’t ever one of Darcy’s preferred activities, and that held true no matter how shitty she was feeling.

By midnight, she was drunk, tired, sore from dancing, and fucking lonely. She left the club thinking that maybe she’d been a little rash. She obviously wasn’t ready to start dating by evidence of the fact she’d A) gone to a club to find a guy, and B) turned down every guy who’d offered. The street was devoid of cabs when she left the club, however, and Darcy was too drunk and too tired to wait for one. She oriented herself and started walking.

Not three blocks away the heel of her shoe snapped and she fell onto the sidewalk with a yelp. She nursed her ankle and glared at her shoe probably a bit longer than was necessary. She couldn’t help it; clutching the broken heel in her hand, Darcy started crying. She didn’t even care about these shoes, but it was too much. She berated herself for even getting in this situation, for being too stubborn to accept company from Steve, from Natasha, from anyone because she was still hung up on stupid Barnes.

“Stop crying, Doll. Come on, let me get you back home.” The man of the hour was offering her a hand up and gentle words.

“What are you doing here?” She snapped.

Barnes kept trying to get her to stand. “Helping you get home safely.”

“Like you care.” She moaned. “God, why are you here? You left, you made your opinion of me clear, and while I’m so glad you can move out and move on, I’m stuck because I can’t get you out of my stupid head let alone off my stupid body.” He’d finally gotten her to her feet and she nearly tripped before remembering to take her shoes off. She braced herself on his arm and glared at it as she realized she was holding the metal one. She couldn’t help the whimper that escaped her throat. “You don’t have to see a reminder of me every time you take a damn shower or change your damn clothes, but I do. I h-have to see your Words on my skin and r-remember that you don’t want me, don’t even want to try to get to know me!” She tried to push away from him, but he grabbed her by her arms as she started to fall again, steadying her.

“Darcy--”

“God, I was so stupid!” She ignored him. He seemed determined to get her home safe, fine, but she was going to give him a piece of her mind in the process. “You know I actually wanted it to be you? From the moment I learned you were alive, I thought to myself how amazing would it be to have James Buchanan Barnes as my soulmate? I mean come on! Best friend to one of the greatest guys I know and a kick ass Howling Commando to boot. And then there you were, in the Tower, and uuuggggh you were so hot even as a shaggy murderous hobo, and working so hard to shove it in Hydra’s face because you were your own person again and they could go suck on a bag of dicks. But no.” She flailed and he caught her again, which was getting annoying. “You don’t want me and you’re a stupid stupidhead for thinking that I’m not awesome enough to be your soulmate, because I am awesome, thankyouverymuch, and I only have one thing to say to you.”

“Just the one?”

He wasn’t allowed to be amused. She glared at him. Then the escapades of the night caught up with her and she emptied the contents of her stomach on his shoes. She had just enough thought left in her fuzzy head to smirk at how well that got her point across before she passed out.

___

He caught her before she hit the pavement and checked her pulse and breathing. She was alive, but very very drunk. He let the worry slip away to be replaced by amusement. His original assessment was correct, she was a spitfire. He could have done without the gross addition to his favorite boots, but after what she’d said he supposed he deserved it.

He carried her all the way back to the Tower, checking her pulse and breathing as he walked to make sure she was still just sleeping and not dead. Jarvis must have warned the team that he’d entered the building with Darcy because they were all there when he got off the elevator.

“Evening.” He greeted stiffly.

“What happened?” Steve asked, concerned.

“She needed help getting home.” Barnes replied.

“She went out alone.” Jane snapped. “How did you-- were you following her?”

He nodded.

“No! You don’t get to abandon her and then follow her around!”

Thor came up to him, face stony, and extended his arms, intent on taking Darcy from him. He felt like arguing; he didn’t want to let her go now that he had her in his arms, albeit not how he’d really imagined having her there. Reluctantly, though, he did pass her over to the thunder god.

“Did she just… pass out? Because you know that’s bad right?” Stark placed a hand to Darcy’s forehead and another to her wrist, checking her pulse.

“She threw up first.” Barnes granted.

Stark grimaced. “That’s not as bad then. Still… I’ll take care of her. You got this Hot Cakes?” From the look he gave Steve, ‘this’ obviously meant Barnes.

Steve nodded once and Thor, Jane, Bruce, and Stark left with the unconscious Darcy.

“She’s right, you know.” Clint stated. “Stalking is a crime.”

“If I hadn’t been there, she’d be alone and unconscious on the sidewalk.” Barnes pointed out.

Natalia hummed lightly, “Which is the only reason we aren’t kicking your ass.”

“If you hadn’t let her leave alone, this wouldn’t have been a problem.” Barnes snapped. Steve had promised to keep an eye on her, after all.

“If you hadn’t left, she wouldn’t have felt the need to get мертвецки пьяный.” Natalia refuted calmly.

“Stop.” Steve ordered. Everyone fell silent as reflex to that tone. “There is enough blame to go around; we all share a portion, and arguing won’t do any good. What I want to know is what are you going to do now, Bucky?” Steve fixed him with a hard look.

“Am I leaving again, you mean.” Barnes corrected.

They all stared at him, waiting for his answer. He sighed. He hadn’t tuned out Darcy’s drunken ramblings; he knew that he’d… miscalculated. He thought that without his presence in the Tower, she’d be able to move on and find someone else. He had forgotten that she was inscribed with his Words on her arm and that she couldn’t escape them whether he was in the Tower or not. It shamed him that he’d so carelessly forgotten that simple fact, but there it was.

He’d been shocked by her admission that she’d wanted her soulmate to be him, and while the verdict was still out on whether or not that made her insane, he felt like maybe she was the kind of insane he liked. Case in point: Steve. The man was obviously off his rocker, but in a way that made him interesting and engaging rather than to be kept in a small, padded room wrapped in a straightjacket. From what he knew of Darcy, she was the same kind of crazy.

All that aside, however, he didn’t know if he was ready to move back in and give the two of them a shot. He was still broken, and he was still putting all the pieces back in place, or… at least putting enough of them back in place to smooth out the sharp edges. If he moved back in, was around Darcy all the time, he knew that he wouldn’t be able to stay away from her. He’d jump in with disastrous results and that was not something he was willing to risk.

Still, the current arrangement was unfair. He meant to fix that.

“I have to,” he decided, “but not like before; I need your help with something.”

He explained himself to the best of his abilities to Steve and Natalia (and by extension Clint, since he didn’t leave) as they accompanied him down to Stark’s lab. There they found the tools Steve needed to help Barnes with his request. As Steve worked, Barnes saw Natalia smile in approval, which only strengthened his resolve that he was finally doing the right thing. It took hours, because Steve was a bit of a perfectionist, but afterwards, Barnes was happy with the results.

Barnes gave Steve a hug in a rare moment of physical affection. He needed to be there when Darcy woke up, however, so he left the others and made his way to medical. Like he suspected, they’d placed her there rather than her own room for observation. Thor stood watch over her still, though it looked as if Stark and Bruce had left. Jane was asleep in an uncomfortable looking chair.

Barnes nodded to Thor in greeting, hoping to forestall any aggression.

“Your actions have not been honorable of late, Shield Brother.” Thor’s use of the familial term surprised Barnes. “But you were there for her when she needed aid, and for that you have my thanks.”

Unsure what to say to that, Barnes just nodded again.

“You wish to make sure she is well before you depart once more?”

“I want to talk to her first. I need to apologize for my less than honorable actions.” Barnes tried a grin on for size as he used the thunder god’s phrasing. He was happy to see a grin mirrored on Thor’s own face, rather than scorn or disapproval.

“Verily.” He clapped Barnes on the shoulder with enough force to rock him a little, but he regained his balance quickly. “She slumbers yet, and I do not believe she will be in a forgiving mood when she awakens, but it is good that you wish to try.”

Barnes rolled his shoulders a little, the thought of facing Darcy’s sharp tongue edged by a hangover did not sound pleasant, but he’d accepted that as he due. He looked over to Jane resting in the chair and nodded her way. “Wouldn’t she be more comfortable in a bed?”

“Aye.” Thor sighed. “Alas, I was unable to convince her to retire to our chambers.”

Barnes cocked his head, looking her over. “She’s kinda tiny. You could just pick her up.” He did not want an audience to his tongue lashing.

Thor chuckled quietly. “A task easily done, and if you request privacy, I will do so.”

Barnes nodded gratefully, and Thor carefully hoisted Jane out of the chair and into his arms. The already tiny doctor seemed impossibly dwarfed nestled into his huge frame, but she didn’t stir even once as he carried her out the door.

Barnes took up residence in the chair she’d vacated and settled in to wait. He allowed himself a short nap once he’d looked over her set up. She had an IV to rehydrate her and there were machine’s monitoring her vitals, so he relaxed. With luck, she wouldn’t be in the worst shape in the morning. As he waited, he worked out precisely what he wished to say. He didn’t want to come off as a stuttering fool, and he hadn’t made the greatest impression thus far. If he wanted to fix that, he needed the right words.

___

As Darcy clawed her way back to consciousness, she didn’t feel as bad as she thought she would considering most of the night before was a bit of a blur. She vaguely recalled yelling at someone, and if her memory was to be believed and it hadn’t been a hallucination brought on by alcohol and depression, that someone was Barnes. The thought of that conversation alone made her nauseous. Alcohol, especially in the quantities she imbibed last night, tended to make her word vomit. Also, actually vomit. The taste in her mouth was enough to clue her in to that little highlight.

She cracked an eyelid open, mentally prepared for the pain of light. When there was no pain, she opened the other eye and looked around. She was in medical--perfect--and had an IV in her arm. There wasn’t enough light for her to read what was in the bag, but whatever it was was obviously helping with the hangover. She also noticed that she wasn’t alone. Barnes, of all people, was sitting in the chair next to her bed, hands folded and holding up his chin as he watched her.

When her eyes settled on him, he spoke softly, “Mornin’.”

“Is it?”

“Closer to evening, actually.”

She groaned.

“Darcy--”

She stalled any comment with the raise of her hand. “Water first.”

He picked up a cup on the small table next to the bed and handed it to her. He waited for her to slowly drink about half of it before continuing, “I want to apologize and to… explain myself.”

“Barnes…” She wasn’t sure she wanted to hear all the reasons he didn’t want to be with her. No. Scratch that. She definitely didn’t want to hear all the reasons he didn’t want to be with her.

“Please. I know I don’t deserve it, but let me explain.” He waited for her to motion for him to carry on. “I was wrong. I made a lot of assumptions that weren’t true, and I reacted in ways that if someone else had done it, I’da beaten their ass. I’m sorry for leaving without any explanation and for thinking that my dumbass face was your only reminder of me, and that without it, you’d be free to realize there’s better out there for you than me.” He held up a hand to stall her retort, and she closed her mouth at his pleading gaze. “I know how you feel on the subject; you were articulate in ways that I, normally, ain’t. I wanted to tell you that I… respect your opinion. You probably think I’m too hard on myself,” she nodded, “and maybe you’re right, but I got my reasons for thinkin’ like I do, Doll, and I’m asking that you try to respect that as well.”

When he was quiet for a bit, she figured she was supposed to respond to that. “I… might be inclined to try that.”

“Thank you. That’s all I ask.”

“So what happens now?” Darcy asked.

“Now, I do what I shoulda done before. I like you, Darcy Lewis, and I want to try this together thing, if you still want to.”

She ran through the Russian alphabet in her head to make sure that her brain was still working properly and she hadn’t blown a fuse last night, that this wasn’t some sort of alcohol induced mirage. Once she’d done that, and she was reasonably certain that he was serious, she gave a hesitant little nod. It was the best she could do at the moment because if she tried to speak, she wasn’t sure she wouldn’t word vomit all over him again.

He smiled and gave a little nod of his own before looking more serious, but less dour than his face had been up to this moment. “I can’t do it like I would otherwise want to, though. You gotta understand, there’s nothing I’d like more than to stay here in this Tower with you, but I can’t. I can’t risk your health and safety by being… as I am now.”

“What are you talking about? You’re fine, you haven’t gone Hail Hydra on anyone since you got here.” Darcy cried.

“That’s because I take myself to my room when I feel like I’m slipping. I don’t sleep so I won’t wake up as the Soldier.” He shook his head. “I’m not done healing, Darcy, and I won’t risk hurting you because I’ve forgotten myself.”

She huffed, but he asked her to respect his opinion and she would. “I get it.”

“I won’t stay away anymore. I’ve got an apartment in Brooklyn; I’m not far.”

He brushed a lock of hair behind her ear and, she couldn’t help it, she leaned her head against the touch of his skin. When she opened her eyes, she saw the metal arm resting on the edge of the bed and, impulsively, she rested her hand on his elbow.

She froze when her fingers registered something off. Where she expected smooth metal, there was roughness. She moved her hand and looked, letting out a gasp when she saw words, her Words, engraved into the metal of his arm.

“You… when did you do this?” She was certain they hadn’t been there last night.

“After I brought you here, I had Steve put them where they belong.”

Darcy was stunned and moved speechless. She rewarded him with a kiss instead. Hesitant at first, but when he didn’t pull away, she mustered what confidence she could and added a little more feeling into it. He paused only a breath before returning the kiss. It was chaste and it ended quickly, too quickly, but it felt right for a first kiss and Darcy sure wasn’t complaining.

“Barnes…” Just a whisper against his lips, like a prayer or a wish.

“Bucky.” He corrected.

Once again, she was speechless. One of the first things she’d heard about his return was that he didn’t want to be called by his old moniker.

Some of her confusion and other jumbled up emotion must have shown on her face, because he gave a self-deprecating grin and said, “Can’t seem to get the punk to break the habit, and it’s actually… good, to hear it. Occasionally remind myself that I’m not just what Hydra made me, and reclaim at least a little of who I used to be. I don’t want everyone using it--not yet--but Steve, you. That feels right.”

She smiled brightly and nodded. “Alright. Bucky.”

He kissed her this time, and yeah, that was definitely all right.

*********

True to his word, Bucky went back to his apartment in Brooklyn, however, unlike before, she had his number and made it a point of texting him throughout the day. He didn’t always text back, but she knew he got them, and when he did decide to converse, they had some really interesting conversations that she would not have expected from him. In addition to daily communication, Bucky made a point of taking her out at least once a week. It was usually somewhere small or quiet where they didn’t have a crowd staring at them, and she was able to add photos of Bucky doing everyday things to her collection. She also gave him a list of movies and TV shows she felt he needed in order to fully integrate into the modern age (and so that he’d get all the references she made out of habit). She was thrilled whenever he told her he’d already seen one of her suggestions, or when he texted her after watching something on his list.

He let her set him up with his own Twitter account after only token protesting and found it endlessly amusing that the public still seemed convinced that she and Steve were an item. Or maybe he was laughing at how she reacted to the idea. She couldn’t tell.

“Stevie did always have a thing for mouthy brunettes.” Bucky joked. Steve was around for that one and punched him solidly in the right shoulder, muttering “Jerk” under his breath while he blushed crimson.

The whole thing had gotten so out of hand that she had press clambering to get an interview with Steve or even with her regarding “Captain America’s soulmate.” She wanted desperately to set the record straight, but she wouldn’t do it without Steve and Tony’s permission. Eventually, after a discussion she was not invited to, they agreed to let Cap break the news to America that their icon was actually bisexual and in a committed relationship with another man. Darcy cheered and scheduled The Interview on Friday with Ellen because she liked Ellen. Favoritism, thy name is Darcy.

Other than that slice of ridiculousness, her life was actually disturbingly normal.

She liked it a lot.

Which of course meant that something had to go wrong.

The call to assemble went out that Thursday evening while they were on a date. Bucky gave her an apologetic look, but she waved him off. “Go on. Go save the world.”

He gave her a quick kiss on the cheek and sprinted away, disappearing into the shadows. She did not envy whatever dumbass decided to interrupt date night. Sighing, she headed home. Their date had been at Bryant Park, only a couple of blocks from the Tower, which was why Bucky had let her walk home. If it had been any further he probably would have insisted on dropping her off first.

She made it all the way up to Jane’s lab for some commiseration ice cream when she lost consciousness.

___

The kid riding around with on the remote controlled death plane was beyond simple to handle. A little hammer use from Thor, some well placed arrows from Clint, and Captain America’s ‘I’m Disappointed in You’ face and it was done. It didn’t require the entire team to take care of, and Barnes grumbled the entire ride home about how his night out with Darcy had been interrupted.

“Night’s still young,” Steve apologized, “the date doesn’t have to be over yet.” He punched Barnes lightly on the shoulder and Barnes waved him off.

“Did this seem a little… easy, to anyone else?” Clint grimaced at the very idea, but voiced it anyway.

Barnes raised his hand, “Yes, my point. Thank you.”

“Can’t help it if we’re ridiculously awesome.” Stark dismissed.

“No, I mean think about.” Clint pressed. “Hydra tech is falling into the hands of amateurs. They use it, we Avenge, city safe, yadda yadda, but what if this is about something else?”

“You have a theory, let’s hear it.” Steve was taking him seriously. Barnes rolled his shoulders and grudgingly paid attention.

“The past few months have been random attack after random attack, yeah?” Clint offered. “What if they weren’t random? Think about it: tonight’s attack was clear on the other side of the city, with few businesses, no landmarks or monuments, in a sparsely residential area--Hell the only thing the place had was shitty ass reception--but it’s the only spot that’s been hit twice.”

“What are you getting at?” Stark frowned, no longer dismissive.

“They’ve been testing our response times.” Natalia hissed.

“The Tower.” Steve snapped.

“The Tower’s the most heavily defensible building in the city.” Stark shook his head. “There’s no way they are getting past Jarvis.”

“They tested that too, remember.” Bruce supplied quietly. “When they attacked--”

“Jane and Darcy.” Steve finished.

There was a rumbling of thunder and lightning lit the sky like fireworks as Thor bristled at the threat. Barnes wasn’t as obvious in his rage, but he seethed below the surface of a blank mask. The jet was not moving fast enough.

“Open the hatch.” Iron Man ordered, faceplate snapping into place.

The rear of the jet opened and Thor took off. Barnes was ready to grab ahold of Stark whether he wanted a ride along or not, but he needn’t have worried. Iron Man grabbed him around the waist and then took off after Thor. Flying like this was not something he’d describe as comfortable, but if it got him to Darcy faster, he’d do it as many times as necessary.

As they approached the Tower, he saw smoke coming from one of the upper floors. If he had to guess, he’d say it was one of the labs. Iron Man flew right for it, setting him down on his feet before landing next to him. The damage was extensive. Hydra had blown a hole in the side of the Tower to get past Jarvis’ defenses, and then… he didn’t know. It was hard to recognize anything beyond the destruction.

“I’m not getting anything from Jarvis on the comms.”

“They are gone.” Thor joined them in the obliterated lab from the hallway.

Then Barnes realized why he didn’t recognize anything; they were in Bruce’s lab, not Jane’s. They came in through the floor below from a level reinforced to prevent accidental Hulk-outs from damaging the structure of the building so they wouldn’t accidentally hurt their target, and then made their way up.

“Did they take anything besides the girls?” Iron Man asked.

Barnes failed to see how that was important at all, but he kept his mouth shut. For the moment. He was too busy planning how best to kill the men responsible for this.

“My Jane’s equipment is also missing.” Thor confirmed.

“I need a computer.” Stark slid the faceplate back up and made for the nearest interface that still functioned. “If they took the equipment then the girls are probably still alive.”

“For now.” Barnes sneared. “They’ll use them against each other to get what information they can.” The idea of Darcy in the hands of those people made him livid.

Thor’s hand was on his arm. He hadn’t noticed when he’d punched a hole through one of the destroyed machines, but he removed his fist slowly and placed his hand against the machine, too agitated to do much else.

“We will return them to safety.” Thor vowed.

“Jarvis, buddy! Talk to me, what happened?” Stark shouted in triumph.

“My external outputs were disabled, Sir.” Jarvis finally came through the speakers. “I was unable to warn you of the attack. I am sorry.”

“Not your fault, J. Tell me you got security footage.”

“Indeed, SIr. They were only able to affect my communications; no other systems were compromised.” Jarvis pulled up the security footage of the attack.

It was surgical. They gained access to the Tower with something that quickly vaporized the wall, damaging the area inside, but that didn’t shake the building like an explosion would. Once the lower level had been breached, the team moved in quickly. Two men disabled the elevator while another piped something through the vents. As they worked, three more men scaled the stairwell up one floor to Jane’s lab where Jane and Darcy were already moving for the panic room, coughing and gagging from whatever was pumped into the air. Two quick shots and both fell unconscious. Two of the men took the girls back down, exiting through the hole in the wall, while the rest of the team took the equipment. It was in and out in ten minutes.

“Can you track them?” Barnes asked.

“Jarvis is already working on pulling up security footage from outside.”

“Status?” Captain America barked, finally joining them in the lab.

Iron Man delivered the rundown. Barnes didn’t listen. He went over the security footage again on another screen, memorizing what he could about the infiltration team. Their faces were covered by gas masks, but the way they moved, what little he could see of their faces, identifying marks, all of it was downloaded into his mind to be analyzed and dissected by the Soldier. The enormous presence at his back told him Thor was doing the same. More than just his size, Thor’s very… aura, if such a thing existed, was a presence next to and behind him, but rather than make him nervous, it made him ready. He had back up, he wasn’t alone, and just knowing that allowed him to find the balance between using the Soldier and becoming the Soldier.

Another rough edge smoothed into something he could use.

A smaller, quieter, but no less deadly presence at his elbow told him Natalia was by his side. He didn’t tear his eyes away from the screen, which was now zoomed in on the man who shot Darcy with a tranq. Instead he shifted his stance ever so slightly to acknowledge her appearance.

“Come, Yasha. There are more productive things we could be doing.”

He wanted to argue, but part of him knew she was right. He’d learned all he could from the video.

He followed her to the lockers where they kept the equipment for missions. Barnes hadn’t been dressed for an attack tonight, and what he was wearing would not be effective for stealth or fighting. He changed into his Winter Soldier kit, reengineered courtesy of Stark, as Natalia changed into her Black Widow gear. She hadn’t been in the Tower when the call came out either. They changed and armed in silence, the only sound the deceptively gentle clink and hiss of metal against reinforced kevlar and cloth. When the call came out that Stark’s tracking was done, they were the weapons Hydra made them, now tempered and strengthened by purpose and choice, eager to strike at the organization that forged them incomplete and broken, not just for themselves, but for the people who helped to make them whole.

____

Darcy came to somewhere cold. She tried to flinch, to huddle in closer to herself to preserve heat, and found that her arms and legs were bound. She fought the urge to scream and won, only just, instead opening her eyes.

She was in a room, dark with that feeling that only comes from a truly empty room. She couldn’t see her own hand in front of her face, and she forced herself to count slowly from one hundred to calm her nerves and slow her breathing to something just on the right side of hyperventilation. Once she’d done that she tried to remember how she got here. She remembered her date with Bucky, remembered going to Jane’s lab, and then… smoke maybe? It was all a bit fuzzy after getting off the elevator.

Testing her bonds revealed them to be made of roughspun rope that chafed her skin, but it was strong. She wasn’t breaking out of them with a little applied force, not that she thought she could have unless they were zipties. Bucky had shown her how to snap ziptied restraints. That had been a fun night (though it had ended before sex, which made her a little sad). She tried to judge the thickness of the rope once she’d pulled her mind from nicer memories, and found it to be about the same thickness as her thumb, but wrapped several times. If she could reach the tiny blade in her shoe--a gift from Natasha--she might be able to cut them loose.

Of course, that plan hinged on her having her shoes. Which she did not. In fact, further exploration found that she was lacking her outter layer of clothes. They’d taken everything with pockets. Her jacket, skirt, and shoes were gone leaving her in her shirt, leggings, and socks. No wonder she was cold. Cold, but not naked. Small blessings.

Before she resulted to gnawing the ropes off, a light flooded the room and she screamed at the piercing brightness. Cowering from the daggers assaulting her eyeballs, she was unable to defend herself from the hands that pulled her to her feet and dragged her from the room. She wriggled, but the barrel of the gun at the base of her skull persuaded her to remain still at least long enough for them to throw her into another room and shut the door.

This room, she observed from her position on the floor, was not empty. It had a Jane in it, which made it miles above the last room she was in regardless of the fact that it also had a sketchy as fuck furniture set up.

“Darcy! Thank the gods, are you okay?” Jane was in a similar position to her own, bound and floor adjacent, but she looked unharmed beyond that.

Darcy managed a nod. “Bit of a hangover.”

“Must be the knock out darts they hit us with.” Jane reasoned, frowning. “I think Tony called them ICERs.”

“You remember what happened?”

Jane huffed. “No. But we aren’t dead and I don’t feel like I’ve been shot, so…”

“Right.” Darcy inch-wormed her way over to her friend and together they helped each other into sitting positions. “Why’d they throw us in here together? Isn’t that like, prisoner taking 101?”

“You’d rather be alone?”

“No, obviously.” Darcy allowed, but the question still bugged her. “I’d rather be on my date.”

Jane actually giggled. It was touch frantic, but Darcy took what she could get.

“Any idea how long we’ve been out?” Darcy asked to fill the silence.

“If it’s the ICERs, and you woke up about when I did, then I think a couple of hours?” Jane figured, though her tone lacked confidence.

“One hour and 49 minutes, to be precise.” A man corrected. Darcy hadn’t heard him enter, but there he was in all his Mad Scientist glory. White lab coat, crazy hair, gloves, accented english… Darcy heaved an internal sigh. She hated cliches. He moved further into the room spewing more words in a sickly sweet tone. “Now that you’re awake, I find I am craving a bit of conversation.”

A squad of men tramped into the room behind the scientist and manhandled Darcy and Jane to different areas of the room. Jane was forced into a chair while Darcy wound up strapped to a table. Yay.

“Now Dr. Foster, as a fellow scientist, I really must commend your work on intergalactic travel. Truly brilliant.” He talked while the men reorganized the room. Jane’s chair was moved to face the table Darcy was on while the ropes on her arms and legs were removed, replaced by heavy leather straps, securing her to the table. She tried to fight, but the gun casually pointed at Jane’s head made her resentfully compliant. “Unfortunately I am not burdened with an overabundance of patience to have a real, honest discussion about it,” the scientist lamented, “so I’m going to have to insist that you simply tell me how to operate the Einstein-Rosen Bridge, and save your vivacious friend a lot of pain.”

“Stiff upper lip, Janey.” Darcy snapped. “The others are coming.”

She got a punch to the solar plexus for her outburst.

“Yes, that is of course an option.” The scientist--she kinda wish she had a name for him, because he was the worst representation of the profession that she’d ever met--nodded calmly, as if he wasn’t holding two women hostage for information. “But you see, I have a feeling that young Miss Lewis is a screamer, and the gents here are eager to find out--”

“You lay one lecherous finger on her--”

“Now, now, Dr. Foster. Don’t be crass. This is polite conversation.” He scolded. “There are far more elegant means of breaking a person.”

One of the grunts next to her table chuckled. “The broken ones are more fun anyway.”

Darcy schooled her features. The Avengers were coming; she could hold out.

“Once again, Dr. Foster, and this is the last time I ask nicely, how do I operate the Einstein-Rosen Bridge?”

“I don’t know, I don’t have it working yet.” Jane confessed.

He tutted. “This is not how I wanted this conversation to go, but if you insist…” He motioned to the goons and Darcy found her table tilt rapidly until her head was now a good six inches below her feet. The sudden drop left her stomach and head reeling, but she managed not to hurl.

“Stop! I’m telling the truth, leave her alone!” Jane cried.

“You understand if I don’t simply take your word for it.” The scientist apologized. He snapped his fingers and Darcy lost sight of Jane as a cloth was placed over her face. She couldn’t help the involuntary jerk as her mind supplied her with what was about to happen. She’d read the Winter Soldier’s files; she knew waterboarding when it was staring her in the face.

Knowing and experiencing were two very different beasts. The water was ice cold making her gasp, and the intrusion of water into her airways was enough to kick higher thinking to the curb. She struggled against her bindings, but the more she fought, the more water made its way into her mouth.

Just as suddenly, the towel and water were removed and it took Darcy a few panting, gasping breaths to realize it was because Jane was screaming, “You win! Stop dammit stop! I’ll show you, just leave her alone!”

Shaking too much to put up a decent fight, Darcy was manhandled again, this time off the table and out of the room entirely. “...no, Jane!”

“Darcy!”

She tried to wriggle out of her captors hands, “Jane!”

The door slammed shut behind her and she was thrown bodily against the opposite wall. It hurt, but the pain did more to clear her head of the feel of water in her nose and lungs than anything. She glared at the men holding her and tried to kick them in tender areas. She managed to drive the heel of her foot into the weak spot just above one of their knees before the other pulled out his gun and slammed it into her gut. It knocked the wind out of her and they pulled her into another room while she was stunned.

They strung her up to a chain hanging from the ceiling high enough to stretch painfully at her shoulders, her only relief when she managed to get her toes on the ground. Moving from the uncomfortable position would put more strain on her shoulders, but already she could feel that her legs were going to cramp up if she wasn’t careful.

Once they had her like that they stepped back, out of reach of her legs just in case, and whistled. “Ain’t you something else.”

“The Avengers are coming.” Darcy threatened.

One of them--she dubbed him Beaker for the giant schnoz on his face--crossed his arms and smiled. “Won’t matter. Once the doc gets the bridge working, we’ll be long gone.”

Darcy rolled her eyes. “The bridge doesn’t work.”

“Doc Metzger thinks otherwise.”

Metzger, she knew that name… Where…? Right! The Winter Soldier file. Doctor Eckhardt Metzger was the man responsible for the latest version of Bucky’s arm. The one who’d been selling tech to every Tom, Dick, and Harry with enough money and moral repugnance to use it on innocents.

“He’s wrong.” Darcy fought the cramp threatening to overwhelm her leg. “Doesn’t work. Thor does all his travel hither and yon the old fashion way.”

The other guy--she’d call him Bunsen for symmetry--scoffed. “She caved easily enough; if she doesn’t have it working yet, she’s close enough to get it working with his… guidance.”

“And then what?” If she could keep them talking, she could stall until the Avengers arrived. Hopefully. They started circling. Like sharks. Darcy didn’t even try to keep them in her sight since all that would accomplish was to make her shoulders hurt (more) and make her dizzy. “For argument’s sake, let’s say you get it working. You think the Nine Realms are going to shelter a bunch of enemies of Asgard? Because, and I don’t know if you know this, that tiny little woman you’ve got strapped to a chair in the other room is the soulmate of the Prince of Asgard. I think he could pretty easily declare the lot of you enemies of the state.”

“Nine Realms… sounds like a lot of places to hide.” Beaker shrugged, scraping the edge of a knife over her ribs. Not enough to even snag the fabric, but the threat was there.

“Well…” Darcy grunted, flexing her calf as best she could to work out the muscles, “Only seven if you think about it, since you obviously can’t go to Asgard and you’re already on Midgard. Although! I hear Helheim is nice this time of year, you should try that one first.”

Bunsen slammed his booted foot into her calf, sending pain up her entire leg and making the muscle cramp. She clenched up the best the chains would allow to try to ease the pain, but it wasn’t really working. She was panting and sweaty by time the cramp worked itself out, and her shoulders were screaming at her for the excess weight.

“You know, you’ve got quite the attitude for someone chained to the ceiling.” Beaker slipped the tip of his knife into her leggings. “You’re the expendable one, remember?”

“If I’m hurt, Jane stops working; no rainbow bridge, no escape, good guys come and beat you into pulp.”

“She’s ain’t watching you now.” The knife sliced through just an inch of fabric.

Darcy glared the best she was able, refusing to track the progress of the knife working its way down. “You’re boss was right about one thing; I am a screamer. If you think she won’t hear me--”

“Ooh, Captain’s got himself a kinky one; it’s always the uptight ones with the weird kinks ya know?” Bunsen chuckled.

Darcy couldn’t help it, she laughed and laughed until she was wheezing. She took her time getting herself back under control, sniggering occasionally as she tried to get her breath back. Both of them were glowering at her like she’d insulted their manhood, and they began to beat her when she didn’t stop.

Finally she calmed herself down enough to tell them, spitting blood out of her mouth, “Sorry about your bad news, cupcake”, Darcy singsonged, “but you wish Captain America was my soulmate.”

Bunsen and Beaker looked adorably confused. One more giggle escaped her throat, but it was enough to send them into motion. Frantically they tore her leggings and shirt off, hunting for her Words. When they found them, another moment of confusion stilled them until Bunsen paled as understanding filled his eyes.

“Winter is coming.” She taunted, whispering in his ear.

When the building shook, they startled, jumping away from her like she’d been the one to cause it.

“Sounds like guests.” Darcy spat more blood out of her mouth.

They glanced at her nervously and ran from the room. Once they were gone, Darcy dropped the bravado and let out a whimpering gasp at the pain. Her shoulders were on fire, her throat and lungs were still reminding her that she’d been drowning not too long ago, she definitely had at least one cracked or broken rib (she remembered that feeling), her legs were seconds away from full blown charlie horses, she thought she could feel the skin of her wrists and hands peeling off, and she was fucking cold.

She heard a ruckus outside her door. Dr. Metzger was shouting, it seemed, ordering people about, and Bunsen and Beaker joined her once again. She tried hard to put the mask back on, but she was too far gone it seemed. Not that it mattered, the two goons were too busy watching the door to pay any attention to her.

Dumbasses.

He dropped silently from the ceiling--a vent maybe, she didn’t know and she didn’t care--landing in a crouch between her and the goons. The sound of his blade slowly unsheathing, made purposefully because he was an assassin trained in stealth, he only made a noise like that on purpose, drew their attention away from the door. He gave them just enough time to take in the scene, realize who had come calling, before he threw his knives.

It wasn’t a quick death.

He turned as they dropped, gurgling and fighting in vain for breath, and assessed Darcy’s condition. She tried to smile at him reassuringly, but she knew it looked more like grimace, and her legs finally gave up, succumbing to the charlie horses that had been threatening since they strung her up. She cried out in pain, quickly biting her lip to keep the sound inside. Bucky knelt again and began to massage her legs, forcing the cramps to subside faster, and she sucked in a huge breath of air despite her lungs and ribs protests when the cramps eased.

He looked up at her, still crouched, and told her, “I’m going to get you down now, but it will hurt. I’m sorry.”

“Do it.” She tried to steel herself as he wrapped his flesh and blood arm around her thighs.

When he stood she nearly screamed as her shoulders were slotted back into their regular alignment, but she managed to restrict it to a sob instead. He reached up with his metal hand and unhooked her from the chain and then he followed her all the way to the ground before using another knife to slice off the ropes.

She was shaking, she knew she was shaking, but she had to make sure of one thing. “Jane…?”

“Safe.” He promised.

She let out an unsteady breath and felt dizzy with relief. “We can leave now, yes?”

He stood, cradling her bridal style, and made for the door. She was pretty sure he stepped on Bunsen and Beaker on his way out. She was also pretty sure that she didn’t care. Natasha met them in the hallway, and Darcy tried to wave, but moving hurt. The redhead reprimanded her with a look. Unnecessary movement was to be avoided, it said. Bucky took them easily from the building, sure of his way, while Natasha covered them, but every step hurt despite his best care not to jostle her and she whimpered.

“Stragglers are being rounded up.” She told Bucky as they neared the exit. “Cap’s got the Doc in custody.”

“Still breathing?” He slipped into Russian.

She nodded.

“Shame.” She and Bucky said together in Russian.

He gave her a look of surprise, but Natasha chuckled.

“Bruce is still Jolly Green at the moment, but Clint should be able to take care of her injuries until we can get her to medical.” Natasha instructed, leading the way to the quinjet.

Bucky kissed her forehead and followed, moving as fast as her injuries would let him. Aboard the jet, he set her down on a cot, taking up position on her left as Clint swooped in and began assessing the damage. Her wrists got wrapped in gauze, her ribs splinted with her right arm--she refused to let go of Bucky’s hand with her left--and her shoulders were iced. She protested that mostly because she was still cold, but a couple of warm blankets found their way onto her person, so she settled down.

“How is she?” Jane’s voice dragged Darcy away from the alluring promise of sleep.

“She’ll be okay.” Clint answered.

Apparently they were all content to talk about her like she wasn’t there. Whatever. She was too tired to yell at them, and Jane sounded fine so she just let herself drift off.

In the end, she spent two weeks in medical due to her injuries and a mild case of pneumonia that developed because of the waterboarding. When that little gem had been discovered she and Steve were the only things keeping Bucky from killing the doc Steve had managed to bring in alive. Tony and Jarvis spent the better part of the that two weeks combing through the doc’s records finding every person he’d sold tech to. Retrieval was handled by Steve, Clint, and Natasha.

Bucky stayed with her though. She tried to tell him it was okay to go play with the other kids, but he flatly refused. Content, he claimed, to stay with her as she recovered. She thought it was sweet and was secretly pleased that he chose her over destroying Hydra tech.

Someone, she thought it might have been Bucky, but it might also just have been Jarvis, recorded the Ellen interview with Steve (graciously postponed to the following Friday due to extenuating circumstances) and she squealed and laughed the entire time as Steve came out to the world in a charming and hilarious interview. It was perfect and she’d been allowed her tablet after much complaining, so she continued to do her job, blatantly ignoring Bucky’s glaring disapproval.

“Not moving, see? Still in bed. Totally counts as taking it easy.”

She had nightmares, but whenever she woke up, Bucky was there. Eventually he just climbed into the bed with her. She didn’t have nightmares after that. When she was released and moved back into her apartment, he followed. She’d been worried that he’d leave, go back to Brooklyn, or worse, decide that his association with her put her in danger and leave for good.

Neither of those things happened, though, and while she was all for not looking a gift horse in the mouth, she had to know.

“Does this,” she gestured to his stuff slowly making its way into her apartment, “I mean… are you staying? Moving in?”

He glanced around as if only now noticing he’d migrated most of his possessions into her space in the span of a few days. “Yes?”

“Oh.”

“...bad?”

“No! I just… you said you didn’t want to before…”

He shook his head. “I said I shouldn’t before, but I realized a few things not too long ago.” He drew her in close, linking their hands behind her back.

“Oh yeah? What’s that?” She smiled.

“One: You really are as bad as Steve, and obviously need my close supervision at all times.” He kissed her, grinning. “And Two: you, and these insane people we live with, are better at easing away the sharp bits of myself than I could ever be on my own, and I’m sorry it took you being in danger for me to recognize that.”

She bumped her head lightly against his. “I knew you would come for me, and you did. That’s all that matters.”

He pulled her in for a kiss. “Always. I will always come for you.”

“Yeah?” She waggled her eyebrows and edged him toward the bed. “Let’s test that shall we.”

He grinned devilishly and let her push him down into the mattress.