Work Text:
The clock ticked steadily on the wall — a sound Zemo usually found comforting.
In that empty Sokovian estate, where echoes had replaced laughter, order was all he had left.
Everything in its place, the tea at the right temperature, silence between each breath.
That was how he survived: by controlling every detail, every word, every feeling.
Until that morning.
An official letter arrived, sealed and stamped — mixed in with the reports Bucky had left on the table.
Zemo opened it without thinking.
He only needed one glance before the world fell out from under him.
The remains of the Zemo family have been exhumed and transferred to the new Sokovia Memorial…
The paper trembled between his gloved fingers.
“Exhumed.” “Transferred.” “Memorial.”
Cold, bureaucratic words for something sacred.
Air left his lungs in a sharp breath. A pressure behind his ribs, a noise that wasn’t quite a cry and wasn’t quite a breath.
He stood frozen, staring out the window.
Bucky walked in, holding two mugs of coffee, about to say something about the news broadcast — but stopped.
The baron stood there like a statue, pale and distant.
—“Zemo?”— Bucky’s voice softened.
No answer. Only a faint tremor in the man’s shoulders.
The soldier glanced down, saw the letter, and read it.
When he looked up again, understanding dawned — and he said nothing.
He simply set the mugs aside and took a quiet step closer.
Zemo didn’t look at him, didn’t move.
—“They didn’t tell me,”— Zemo murmured, voice thin—. “They moved them like… cargo.”
Bucky exhaled, slow. He’d seen this before — the body of someone about to break but too trained to let it happen.
He approached.
—“Zemo,”— he said gently, —“Sit down.”
A tiny shake of the head.
—“I’m fine.”
It was a lie so fragile it nearly broke the air around them.
Bucky placed a hand on his shoulder.
—“You don’t have to be.”
For a heartbeat, Zemo’s eyes met his.
There was fear there, and a kind of pleading.
Then Bucky stepped back — just enough to open his arms.
No words. No pity. Just an invitation.
Zemo froze, unsure how to respond. But the ache in his chest was unbearable.
And before he could stop himself, he stepped forward.
The embrace was awkward at first — stiff, uncertain.
Then, as Bucky’s hand found the back of his neck, something inside Zemo broke open.
A sound escaped him, raw and small.
And the man who never cried… began to cry.
Bucky held him close. No soldier, no baron — just a man weeping against another’s shoulder.
Tears soaked through fabric. His body trembled.
Bucky didn’t let go.
—“You can cry, Zemo,”— he whispered, low and steady—. “No one’s going to take that from you.”
Zemo shuddered. The words landed deep, cutting through years of restraint.
He wept until the sobs turned into silence, until the weight in his chest dulled into exhaustion.
When he finally lifted his head, sunlight streamed through the window — soft and gold.
—“Forgive me,”— he whispered.
Bucky shook his head.
—“There’s nothing to forgive.”
Zemo blinked.
—“I’m not used to… showing this. It feels like weakness.”
—“No,”— Bucky said simply—. “It’s human.”
They stood in quiet for a long moment.
Then Bucky’s voice, rough but honest:
—“When I lost Steve, I thought I couldn’t feel anything again. But pain doesn’t leave — it just learns to sit quietly. The trick is not to face it alone.”
Zemo looked at him.
—“Did you learn that?”
—“Still trying,”— Bucky admitted with a faint smile—. “But I’m getting there.”
Something softened in Zemo’s chest.
He walked to the window, looking at the gray hills beyond.
For once, he didn’t hide his face.
Bucky joined him quietly.
—“Do you want me to come with you? To the memorial?”
Zemo hesitated.
—“You’d do that?”
—“Yeah. No one should say goodbye alone.”
The silence that followed was warm.
Zemo nodded.
—“Then… at dawn.”
—“I’ll bring flowers.”
Zemo almost smiled.
—“My wife hated flowers.”
—“Then we’ll bring coffee,”— Bucky said—. “We’ll talk to them instead.”
A quiet laugh escaped Zemo — small, real, unexpected.
And Bucky knew: the walls were finally cracking.
⸻
Epilogue
Sokovia woke under a veil of mist.
Zemo knelt before the new gravestones, placing a steaming cup on the marble.
For a moment, the rising vapor looked like a soul ascending.
Bucky waited a few steps behind, silent.
Zemo whispered something in Sokovian — a prayer, a farewell.
When he stood, the wind brushed his coat, light and calm.
It didn’t hurt as much anymore.
Not because the grief was gone, but because someone had carried part of it with him.
Bucky handed him a small thermos.
—“Still hot.”
Zemo took it, nodded once.
—“Thank you, James.”
—“Anytime. Sometimes that’s all we need — company.”
They walked side by side into the fog.
And for the first time in years, Helmut Zemo breathed without fear.
The man who didn’t cry… had finally learned how to heal.