Archive of Our Own ^beta

There is a hiss of decompression, and Bucky opens his eyes. He is in a small room with glass walls, inside of a slightly larger small room. One panel of the inner wall is white. There is no door. Mildly annoying music is playing from a radio in the corner.

“Hello, and welcome to the Aperture Science Enrichment Center. Your computer-aided testing will begin shortly. I am IRoN, and I will be your computer aid for this experiment,” a masculine voice says, and it sounds like it’s coming out of the very walls, from all around him. Bucky stands quickly, and tries to orient himself. Experiment? What’s going on? And why can’t he seem to remember anything? “Please note that all computer aid will be entirely nonphysical, and thus serious injury may occur. For your safety and the safety of others—“

But the voice—IRoN’s voice—cuts out before it can tell him what, exactly, will make him safe. Bucky looks down and finds that his hands don’t match; his left arm is made entirely of metal. He wonders if that’s what IRoN means by serious injury. He wants to ask, but he doesn’t. He keeps his mouth shut, and doesn’t make a sound.

Bucky has no idea which, if any, of these things is normal. He can’t remember.

“The testing will begin when the portal opens in three, two, one.” IRoN goes silent, and a portal does indeed open, in the white section of the wall. Bucky looks around for anything else to do, finds nothing, and walks through the portal.

*

It doesn’t take long for Bucky to understand what IRoN means by testing. Mostly, it involves jumping through portals and solving puzzles by placing Weighted Storage Cubes on 1500 Megawatt Super-Colliding Super Buttons at the right times. Occasionally, it involves flying through the air at tremendous speed, because it turns out portals conserve momentum.

Bucky has no idea how he knows what that means.

“Speedy thing goes in, speedy thing comes out,” IRoN helpfully informs him, after letting him zoom around for the first few minutes uncontrolled.

He does know that flying through the air was utterly terrifying the first time he did it out of necessity, and then he realized that the strange Long Fall Boots strapped to his feet ensure that he lands head up, feet down, every time, and miraculously, the shock never shatters any of the bones in his body. It’s barely even jarring. After that, he’s a lot less afraid.

He is a little afraid of his left arm, though. It’s strong, lifting the heavy metal cubes with ease, and it has no such safety feature. If he’s not careful, Bucky might take off his nose trying to scratch it.

*

A cube falls out of the Vital Apparatus Vent in the ceiling and lands on Bucky’s arm before he can catch it, jarring the metal all the way up to the shoulder. A white light flashes behind his eyes, and it’s not quite pain.

But he remembers being in pain.

He screams when the blades come down on his arm, and another needle slides into his neck, dulling the pain until he can barely feel it. Drugged half out of his mind, he watches almost dispassionately as the numb, wrecked remains of his arm are cleared away and the shiny replacement is wired in. He really likes how shiny it is, how it catches the light so prettily—

“Please stay still, James Barnes. This is the only way to keep you safe. Damaged subjects are discarded and replaced.” The voice comes from a sphere with a placid pale blue light set into it, and he’s immediately irritated with it for distracting him from the flashing brilliance of his new arm. It doesn’t seem to mind, though. It just continues speaking in a soft, reassuring voice. “Please stay still, James Barnes.”

He does his best.

Eventually, the pale blue core has to leave him and go away, and he goes to sleep for a long, long time.

Bucky shakes off the flash of memory, and wonders if he can trust it.

*

IRoN talks to Bucky, between Enrichment Center testing chambers. He gives Bucky advice that is condescending but sometimes helpful, and occasionally insults his performance for no reason that Bucky can discern. He’s doing pretty well, he thinks. At least, he hasn’t gotten himself hurt yet. He has his own portal gun now, so that he can place the portals instead of just jumping through them. That’s got to be some kind of achievement, right?

The more IRoN talks, the more his voice gets inside Bucky’s head.

There’s something about it that seems familiar, for no reason that Bucky can explain. He’s heard it before, but he thinks it sounded different then.

But he has no reason to trust his own mind, not without memories. Maybe it’s just familiar because it’s the only voice he’s heard for the past…

Hours? Days?

Bucky has no idea how long it’s been.

He keeps testing.

*

Bucky learns that the risk of death is a real thing in these tests. A fall won’t kill him, but one of those red-eyed turrets with endless ammunition might. Fortunately, they fizzle out pretty quick when Bucky can figure out how to knock them over.

He wonders why IRoN wants him dead.

*

Some of the testing chambers, Bucky comes to understand, are in better repair than others.

In one of them, a panel has come loose from the rest of the wall, and IRoN—evidently—has not been able to fix it. So Bucky destroys every one of IRoN’s cameras he can, and slips behind the panel. It feels illicit and wonderful, like he’s getting away with something, though he thinks IRoN probably has some other way of monitoring him, on top of the cameras.

He’s completely unprepared for what he finds behind the panel. He doesn’t know what he was expecting, but this—this wasn’t it.

It looks, at first, like a service area, with rickety stairs and maintenance hatches. And it is that, probably. It’s just something else, too.

It’s a place for someone to live.

There’s food and water lying around everywhere, and seats, and a small cot, and even an ancient broken radio lying on an upturned crate. It’s obvious that someone has been spending time back here, someone alive, who eats and drinks and sleeps, and Bucky shudders with longing because he can’t remember the last time he saw anyone human. He entertains a brief, intense fantasy of escaping the test chambers and living in the walls like this, the way some other person once had, but all the doors are locked, and Bucky can’t get them to budge even with his metal hand. The food containers are all empty. He’ll have to go back out to test.

Bucky almost cries.

Then he takes in the walls, and he does cry. There are paintings on every vertical surface and some of the horizontal ones, done in what medium he can’t begin to imagine. He doesn’t know how he knows about art mediums to begin with. The paintings are beautiful.

There are turrets, cubes, buttons, all the things Bucky sees every minute of every day, but there are other things too. The sun, the sky, a field of wheat that looks more tantalizing than anything Bucky can imagine.

And there’s one of him. At least, Bucky thinks it’s him. He doesn’t remember the last time he saw his own face, but when he looks at the painting, he feels like he recognizes it. It has dark hair and pale eyes, like him. It has his jaw, he thinks, except that his has gone rough with stubble. And it has two arms, two ordinary arms made out of flesh, neither one a shiny, shiny piece of metal strong enough to lift the Weighted Storage Cubes.

But it isn’t any of those things that makes Bucky cry.

*

Bucky cries because he recognizes the art.

“Hey, lookit this,” a blond boy says, calling him over. He gamely goes to look, and huffs to cover the flush that rises in his cheeks.

“You ain’t drawin’ me again, are you?” he asks.

“’Course I am,” the boy responds. “What else should I wanna draw but my… my boyfriend?” At this last word, the boy’s voice drops into an almost inaudible register, like it’s an exciting secret. Well, it kind of is. They keep it a secret just because it feels exciting and illicit, but he thinks they might tell people soon. The boy smiles at him, and kisses him shyly, and then the two of them kiss for a long time on the couch.

They separate when they hear the jingle of keys that means the boy’s mother is approaching the door, but he isn’t sure why. He has the strongest sense that the boy’s mother already knows the secret, and lets them keep it because she’s so nice.

Both of them are so nice, mother and son, and he loves them both really, only he can’t even imagine what he would do if he didn’t have the blond boy to kiss and hold and talk to every minute of every day. He doesn’t love anyone quite like he loves this boy.

“You boys have a good time hanging out?” the mother asks, and there’s just a little tiny gleam in her eye that says she knows more than she’s saying. The boy doesn’t seem to notice it, though. They both try to contain their blushes while they tell her that yes, they did have a good time, and it’s probably about time for him to be heading home. The mother—who is very nearly mother to both of them—says he doesn’t have to go. She says he’s part of the family in all but name, and he smiles.

He’s always happy to stay. He loves them.

The art in the hidden space is the same as the art in the blond boy’s sketchbook. Bucky loves him, so he has to know more; he spends several minutes looking intently at every drawing, every scribble, every line the boy has put up on the wall, and eventually he finds something invaluable. The work is signed.

Steve.

Bucky doesn’t remember much, but he does remember that he loves a beautiful blond boy named Steve, and the boy he loves has left him art, hidden in the test chambers.

Bucky cries because he’s happy.

Then he returns to the testing chamber, and to IRoN.

*

In every chamber, now, Bucky looks for a way back to that space behind the panels. Most of the time, he doesn’t find it; he knows that IRoN doesn’t want him to. IRoN just wants him to keep testing.

IRoN’s voice keeps niggling at something in the back of Bucky’s brain, and he still can’t put his finger on it.

Sometimes, there are ways. Once, a panel was wedged open by a leftover cube. Once, the blocks of the wall hadn’t quite fit together, and there had been a little tiny crawlspace left open. Every time he sees his chance, Bucky takes it. He scrambles to get to the little openings, ducks and wedges himself through them, and finds himself surrounded by beauty. It’s decrepit and old, which is terrifying—how much time had Bucky lost?—but it’s also gorgeous, in more than one way.

He’s always loved Steve’s art, he’s certain of that somehow, but this is even more important, because it means hope. It means there is a way out, somewhere hidden in the maintenance passages, a way for Bucky to escape the endless cycles of testing.

More often than not, the art brings back memories long-buried.

Bucky remembers the taste of Steve’s mouth, the feeling of his hair under Bucky’s fingers, the sound of his laugh when Bucky said something funny, and his endearing huff when Bucky irritated him. Every time he finds a new piece of Steve’s art, he stands in front of it for minutes on end, waiting for the white light behind his eyelids to bring him back a few more snippets of his past.

This time, when Bucky makes it through the miniscule passage into the space beyond, the art is a single painting, a mural, taking up a huge space on one wide swath of wall. Unlike the others, Bucky can’t even begin to guess what this one is a painting of.

In the center, there is a blue core, like the one that had given Bucky his metal arm but darker, richer somehow. It’s beautiful, but somehow Steve has gotten it to convey frailty as well, a light on the verge of being snuffed out.

Around it, besieging it, are three other cores. A yellow one tries to drag it away by a length of cable. An orange one tries to drown it in a flood of what might be ocean waves, or possibly a river of dollar bills. It’s hard to tell, because the work is so old. A red core is positioned at the top of the mural, beating down on the blue core like a hot sun or a slave driver.

Under their onslaught, the blue core looks unsteady, and on the edge of giving out.

Bucky wonders what it means, what Steve had intended it to represent. He hopes the blue core is doing okay.

*

Bucky remembers being in a room full of cores.

There are dozens of cores, most of them dull and dark, waiting to be filled with an Intelligence. There are a few, though, on shelves closer to the lab desk, that are lit up in lovely colors. Pale blue, green, pink, yellow. There’s an orange one shoved to the side and facing the wall, like it’s unwanted. The room is dim, but they fill it with an unearthly glow, pearly and pastel and oddly sweet.

He isn’t paying attention to the cores, though. He’s too busy kissing and being kissed.

Bucky’s very pleased at first, when this memory begins to return, but then he furrows his brow. It’s a memory of kissing Steve, but—

He bites down, and a dark-haired boy draws back in surprise before diving back in for more. Steve, standing beside them, lets them go on for a minute longer before he interjects, stealing the dark-haired boy away from him and kissing him enthusiastically, like this might be his only chance to do it.

Then Bucky kisses Steve and the dark-haired boy watches by the glow of the cores around them. He makes a helpless sound of excitement and wonder, and it sounds so sweet that Bucky goes back to kissing the boy, trying his best to tease that sound out again with his tongue. They’re all eager and their hands are wandering. Steve, in his impatience, doesn’t wait for Bucky to be done getting his kiss; he just goes for the boy’s neck, biting gently at the hollow of his delicate throat and tonguing his smooth olive skin, careful not to leave any marks.

They all trade back and forth for as long as they think they can, and it doesn’t feel like nearly long enough before they know they’ll be missed. They separate breathlessly and linger as long as they can over sincere promises to see each other again, as soon as may be.

The dark-haired boy looks sad as Steve and Bucky leave him behind.

Bucky wonders who that other boy, that third to their number, had been. He had seemed… sweet. Bucky thinks he wouldn’t mind remembering more of him, too.

*

One of the testing chambers is severely damaged. Bucky walks in, and he sees that a whole wall is out of place, panels hanging haphazardly on their limp, disarrayed arms. And behind them—

Behind them, among the support struts and the maintenance catwalks, Bucky can see sunlight, and what looks like—a giant potato plant?

It doesn’t make sense, but Bucky doesn’t care. He sprints for the wall, chasing the first natural light he’s seen in days, weeks maybe. This is his chance to get out and escape and finally, finally stop the endless testing cycle, stop flying through portals and knocking over turrets and placing heavy gray cube after heavy gray cube.

IRoN begins to repair the wall as soon as he becomes aware of it, mechanized arms dragging the panels back into place, sealing up the wall and locking that scrap of light and life away behind bleak white chamber walls. Bucky can only think that this might be his last chance, and it’s slipping away, and he dives—

He doesn’t make it in time.

All he gets is one handful of potato leaves before the panel snaps into place and breaks the stem, and Bucky shakes with disappointment. He eats the leaves, because they’re the first real food he’s seen in what feels like forever, and he doesn’t even care that he gets sick.

“I told you that was going to happen,” IRoN complains, as Bucky lies on the floor and slips away into delirium. His head is aching and his stomach feels like it’s tying itself into knots inside of him. “They’re poisonous, and I warned you, and did you listen? Now you’re going to be sick everywhere, and you could die if the bots can’t pump your stomach in time—“

It sounds almost like IRoN cares, Bucky thinks, and then he passes out.

*

Aperture is having a Take Your Child To Work Day, and Steve is going with his mother. Bucky tries, at first, to pretend that he isn’t insanely jealous—he loves science and science fiction more than anything, and what’s closer to science fiction than Aperture Science? Then, it turns out he doesn’t have to be jealous, because Steve’s mother is kind and generous enough to take Bucky with her, too.

Bucky’s ecstatic, when he hears that.

The only stipulation is that the children who come to Aperture need to bring some kind of science project, for a fair. Neither Steve nor Bucky can think of anything good, so they build a twenty-minute potato battery, pack it into Tupperware, and plan to spend most of their time looking around at the facility itself.

*

As predicted, the science fair at Aperture is utterly boring. It seems Steve and Bucky weren’t the only ones at a loss for inspiration, or the only ones who scraped together a potato battery at the last minute.

It doesn’t matter, though, because they’re at Aperture Science, and there are Aperture Scientists everywhere, and everyone is so damned smart that Bucky feels like he can finally relax a little bit. He knows he’s no idiot, but it hadn’t taken him long to see how bad all the kids at school treated Steve for being shorter and still smarter than all of them combined, so Bucky learned to dumb himself down. Talk the talk.

Here, he’s allowed to be as smart as he possibly can. He’ll still probably look like an idiot, but it’ll be fair, now.

It takes Steve and Bucky less than five minutes to abandon their potato battery and go exploring, with a promise to Steve’s mother that they’ll be back at the fair hall by lunchtime, so that she can take them to the mess. They walk past informational signs and demonstrations, and more than a few closed R&D lab doors, where they peer with fascination through the windows. In one or two places, they actually go into the observation booths of the testing chambers, and watch as Aperture employees try out new equipment for the cameras. Future technologies unfold in bright colors and occasional explosions, right in front of their eyes.

Bucky’s so excited, he thinks he might be vibrating. The last time he was this keyed up, he had just kissed Steve for the first time.

He really, really loves science.

*

While they’re wandering down the hall, Steve nudges Bucky’s arm and points to a door that’s wide open. The room behind is dim, but lights flash out into the hallway every few seconds, promising something intriguing. They head inside.

The room beyond is full of cores, most inactive, a couple brightly lit. Some are laid out on a desk, where a man in a dark suit is sitting. What looks like a partial core is being held by a boy about their age, with unruly dark hair, olive skin, and bright, bright blue eyes. They look even brighter in the light cast from the core, which is a deep blue like a mountain lake.

He’s very pretty, Bucky acknowledges. He meets Steve’s eyes, and it’s plain that he agrees.

“Hey,” Bucky says, because he’s the smooth one of them. “You here with your dad?” he asks, indicating the man at the desk.

The boy looks up, startled. He almost drops the light in his hands.

“What? Oh, no,” the boy answers, getting to his feet and wiping his greasy hands on his already grease-stained jeans, as though he’s embarrassed. “No, he’s, uh, my butler. I’m a scientist.”

“An Aperture Scientist?” Bucky asks, just a little disbelieving. He doesn’t want to be doubtful, it’s just—well—the boy’s so young. It’s crazy to think of anyone his age being an Aperture Scientist.

“Yeah,” the boy says defensively, and Bucky backs off a little. He didn’t mean to be insulting.

“That’s amazing,” he says instead.

“Really?” the boy asks. It sounds like a real question, which makes Bucky’s heart twinge with concern and affection. He guesses he’s always gonna be a sucker for a guy who doesn’t know how great he is.

“Really!” Steve adds, with all his sincere enthusiasm. “You must be some kinda genius!”

“I, uh, yeah,” the boy answers, embarrassed again, though Bucky really can’t imagine why. “I’m Tony.” There’s a long pause, and the boy blushes, warmth spreading under his cheeks. It’s a very pretty look on him. “Tony Stark.”

“You mean Howard Stark is your dad?” Steve demands eagerly. Howard Stark runs Aperture, and Steve, like Bucky, is excited about all things Aperture. Bucky is the one who notices the little hunch of Tony’s shoulders when he hears his father’s name.

“Psh. I bet he’s all talk,” Bucky says, just for the little smirk it puts on Tony’s face. “Tell me about what you do? Is that a core?”

“No, it’s something new… it’s not as exciting as the Dual Portal Gun or the Personality Cores or anything like that, but I think… I think it could be really important anyway,” Tony begins shyly. Bucky smiles encouragingly, and Tony starts to pick up steam. “I call it an arc reactor. It uses a palladium core to stabilize a reaction that can generate three gigajoules per second. It’ll be expensive to manufacture at first, but the energy it produces is completely clean, and it’ll more than cover it’s own cost if you just keep it running long enough! With enough development, I could make this into a source of cheap, environmentally friendly, and efficient power all over the world. I could—“

All at once Tony cuts himself off and seems to shrink a little.

“What’s wrong?” Bucky asks him.

“Nothing, just… you don’t want to hear all the details, it’s technical. You wouldn’t understand.” The shyness has reappeared in Tony’s voice. It’s not an insult; it’s an excuse and a fear. He wants to explain it, but he’s scared of opening himself up. Bucky doesn’t know what to say.

Luckily, Steve does.

“That doesn’t matter. You want to tell us, and we’d love to listen,” he says, as if that’s all the reason in the world. “And anyway, you’re so smart, I bet you could explain it so that anybody could understand.”

Tony’s smile comes back, and it’s so gorgeous that Bucky gasps quietly and Steve leans into him like he needs support. Yeah, they’re crushing on him, hard and fast. Tony goes on for minutes on end about how he built his arc reactor and the research he intends to do to make it affordable and marketable, and Steve and Bucky listen with rapt attention because it’s fascinating, not just because Tony is stunning when he gets into a passion.

It doesn’t hurt that he is, though.

*

Eventually, Bucky gets a good look at the cores around the room. All of them are labeled neatly, but Tony seems to have given them unofficial names as well. The pink Management Core is called Pepper, and it has a woman’s voice and seems particularly interested in taking care of Tony, scheduling time for him to eat and sleep so he remembers to do it. Curiosity Core, Maya, was apparently intended to be Tony’s lab assistant and has a warm yellow light.

The green Encouragement Core, Rhodey, is the one that makes Bucky hug Tony for the first time.

“Encouragement Core wasn’t my first choice,” Tony blurts, like he isn’t sure why he’s spilling so much to these two strangers who wandered into his lab, but can’t quite stop himself. “I, uh, I wanted to name it Friendship Core. It was my first real friend, you know. But Dad thought that would be kind of pathetic, so Encouragement it is,” he says haltingly, with a resigned twist of his mouth.

That’s when Bucky can’t help himself. He throws his arms around a confused Tony and holds on until he feels better, because Goddamn. Over Tony’s shoulder, he can see the angry gleam starting in Steve’s eye, the one that usually heralds an alley scrape that Bucky will have to pull him out of. He shakes his head slightly, reminding Steve that what Tony needs probably isn’t a fight right now.

Eventually Tony reluctantly fights his way out of Bucky’s arms—it seems like it’s been a long time since anyone hugged him properly—and he introduces them to the few remaining cores.

Bucky likes Reward Core, which is orange. All it seems to do is spit out a string of numbers, adding up a series of values and counting out money constantly. It has a pompous, supercilious voice, which makes the numbers sound ridiculous. It’s called Ty, but Tony says he modeled it off of his father. Both Bucky and Steve take a kind of vicious joy in its existence.

The last one Tony introduces brings back the blushes and the shy hunches of his shoulders; it’s pale blue and labeled Medical Core, though Tony calls it Yinsen.

“It was, uh. I modeled it after your mom,” Tony admits to Steve. “Rogers, right? She’s brilliant, and I thought, well, it’d be great if I could put some of her aptitude for biology into one of the cores. It’s not quite the same, but it’s like… part of her is immortal now.”

That’s when Steve hugs Tony.

*

After a while, they notice that the butler—Jarvis—is gone.

Tony blushes furiously when they point it out, and won’t explain why or where Jarvis has gone, but Steve and Bucky understand anyway. Tony likes spending time with them, really likes it, and he had wanted a little privacy, to keep his new friends to himself for a little while.

Steve and Bucky want a little more than friendship with him, though.

Steve is the brave one; he takes Bucky’s hand plainly in Tony’s view. Tony’s expression shutters with resignation, like he’s already measured himself against them and found himself wanting and unwanted. But he doesn’t look like he doesn’t want them back.

So Steve steps forward and puts a hand on the side of Tony’s face. Tony’s breath catches and his eyes flick back and forth between Steve and Bucky like he doesn’t know what to think. Steve goes up on tiptoes and kisses him. Tony leans into it automatically, but his eyes go wide and they lock on Bucky.

Before Tony can start thinking anything bad, Bucky steps in close, too, and presses their lips together in a deep kiss.

Tony’s smile is blinding when they withdraw.

*

Bucky wakes in a new testing chamber and decides never to eat a single potato leaf again, no matter how appetizing it looks at the time. He has the hangover from hell; his head hurts, and he aches all over. His throat is raw like he’s thrown up several times and the acid was never properly rinsed away.

“Oh good, you’re awake,” IRoN says. His voice seems more familiar than ever, but Bucky’s head is pounding and it’s all he can do to struggle to his feet. “Next time you get the urge to kill yourself, do it in a testing chamber where I can at least get some useful data.” There’s a stutter, like a skip in the tape, and IRoN’s voice changes just a little. It sounds less electronic, more emotional. “Or just don’t die. That’s a better plan. We don’t want that at all.”

It’s confusing, but Bucky would rather process his newly-reacquired memories than process IRoN’s weirdness, so he just readjusts the portal gun on his right arm and gets back to testing.

*

“This Weighted Companion Cube will accompany you through the test chamber,” IRoN informs him, nearly dropping the thing on Bucky’s head. “Please take care of it.”

Take care of it? That doesn’t seem in keeping with IRoN’s test-first-ask-questions-later policy. Bucky takes a closer look at the cube that almost concussed him and sees that it’s different from the others: there’s a heart painted on the side of it. Wooo. Big deal.

But he picks it up and takes it with him all the same. It’s useful, holding down a couple of buttons for him, and blocking a Thermal Discouragement Beam that might’ve cut him in half. This so-called Companion Cube is useful, but no more interesting than any other cube Bucky’s used so far that didn’t have a heart painted on it.

Just when Bucky has decided this, the Companion Cube starts talking.

“Bucky?” it says, and Bucky spins around and nearly drops it in surprise. It’s been a very long time since he’s heard any voice but IRoN’s.

“The symptoms most commonly produced by Enrichment Center testing are superstition, perceiving inanimate objects as alive, and hallucination,” IRoN rushes to assure him. “The Enrichment Center reminds you that the Weighed Companion Cube is not alive and in fact cannot speak.”

That certainly sounds plausible, Bucky allows. He’s been alone for a very long time. He’s still recovering from solanine poisoning, which had done some trippy things to his head.

The only problem is that IRoN is the one saying it to him. And while some of IRoN’s advice has been helpful… most of it, the vast majority, has been intended only to keep Bucky testing and undistracted, at any cost.

“Bucky, it is you!” says the voice from the Companion Cube. He knows that voice, he thinks.

“The Enrichment Center reminds you that the Weighted Companion Cube cannot speak,” IRoN insists. Yeah, Bucky’s definitely sure that it’s real now. “In the event that the Weighted Companion Cube does speak, the Enrichment Center urges you to disregard its advice.”

Doesn’t IRoN know anything about humans? For Bucky, that was as good as an instruction to do exactly what the voice from the cube is telling him.

No matter how crazy that sentence sounds in hindsight.

“Bucky, you gotta get me out of here. I can help you! Come on, man. Please?” the cube says. It sounds plaintive and scared and oh—yeah, that’s an Aperture Emergency Intelligence Incinerator up ahead. No wonder the cube is frightened.

Gently, Bucky sets it down and begins running his fingers over the surface of the cube, looking for a seam to dig his metal fingers into. Eventually he finds one, a weld point where the cube must’ve been sealed shut, and he pries it open.

A green light meets his eyes.

A white light fills his mind.

*

On their way out, Bucky and Steve are stopped by a sound like a cough from one of the cores sitting on the desk. It’s the green one labeled Encouragement Core, the one Tony had said was his first best friend. Rhodey. They turn to look at it.

“I take care of Tony,” Rhodey says, sounding proud. “I have a lot of jobs, but that one is the most important to me. He’s my friend. Are you his friends?” he asks. The question comes out vaguely threatening, and Bucky feels himself getting defensive.

“’Course we are,” he says immediately.

“Rhodey, honeybear, that’s really unnecess—“ Tony tries to interrupt, but Management Core, Pepper, cuts him off with a tutting noise.

“It’s completely necessary for your wellbeing, Tony,” she insists. Tony shuts up, but he looks apologetically at Steve and Bucky, like they shouldn’t have to deal with this. Well, maybe they should, Bucky thinks. It’s important that Tony has people who take care of him, even if they are mechanical Personality Cores.

“We ain’t gonna mess him around,” Steve says reassuringly. “I’da never kissed him if I didn’t mean it.”

There’s something like wide-eyed wonder on Tony’s face now, and Bucky realizes just how important this is. Not just that Tony’s friends know that these two near-strangers are serious about him, but that Tony knows that they’re serious about him. Tony needs to hear this.

“If all we wanted was fun, well, we got that already. With each other,” Bucky says. “We want him for more than that. Wanna see where it goes. Hopin’…” Bucky crosses his fingers that this isn’t too much too soon. “Hopin’ it goes somewhere serious.”

“I suppose that’s acceptable,” Pepper says, rocking back and forth on the table slightly in an approximation of a nod.

“I’ll keep an eye on you, of course,” Rhodey adds, and the cover for his lens slides down slightly, like he’s narrowing his eyes at them. Steve and Bucky both nod in acknowledgement; that seems fair. They kiss Tony’s cheeks before they go, making him blush adorably.

*

“Rhodey?” Bucky says, pulling the green core out of the shreds of the Companion Cube.

“Yep, that’s me,” Rhodey says, rolling around in his housing like he’s stretching. He looks battered, definitely worse for wear, but he still seems to be in working order. “We’ve gotta get out of here before IRoN runs out of tests for you to do. When you stop being useful…”

He trails off pointedly, but Bucky can imagine what he means.

“What do we do?” Bucky asks. It feels good to talk to another person finally.

“So you can speak! I had wondered if your vocal chords were damaged by your time in the Relaxation Vault,” IRoN says from the ceiling, but they ignore him.

“We break out of here,” Rhodey says with determination. “Now that I’m out of that awful box, I ought to be able to—there! I got it!”

A panel slides open in the wall, revealing that tempting maintenance passage that Bucky has spent so long looking for. Bucky picks Rhodey up and runs for it.

“Where are you going?” IRoN demands. “The test isn’t over yet! You’re going the wrong way! Come back!”

IRoN sounds both furious and scared, and Bucky’s heart breaks for reasons he can’t quite explain, but he keeps running. He and Rhodey dive behind the panel just before IRoN finds the override for it, and it slams shut behind them, locking them into the maintenance corridor.

It’s dimmer back here, decrepit, dirty and rusty and old, but it also feels like freedom. Bucky can still hear IRoN calling after them, but his voice is distant now, like it can’t touch him.

(It can touch him. It touches a melted corner of his heart, the part that recognizes the voice as familiar. It melts it a little more, every time.)

Bucky and Rhodey set off along the dingy hallway.

*

Bucky lives that way for a long time. He runs through the corridors and catwalks and rickety staircases and sleeps where he finds old office chairs and cots. Occasionally, he finds caches of water and cans of beans, and they feed him for days at a time. It’s not easy, but it’s a life. It’s more of a life than he’d had in the Enrichment Center testing chambers.

And he has Rhodey with him, to keep him company, to help remind him of little human things that help to bring his memories back. He likes to think that Rhodey likes having his company, too.

He worried at first that he would need to go back into IRoN’s grasp to find a port to charge Rhodey from, but Rhodey reassures him that he’s powered by Tony’s invention, the arc reactor he had been so proud of.

Sometimes, they come across more of Steve’s artwork, and it always makes Bucky happy to see it. He wonders how long Steve survived back here before IRoN—inevitably—caught up with him.

They keep going. They can’t stay in one place for too long, because IRoN is always shifting things around, moving rooms and halls and panels to create new testing chambers and to find his missing lab rat. After a while, Bucky forgets what it’s like to be stationary, but he remembers what it’s like to be human, so he thinks it’s a fair trade.

*

Sometimes, Bucky has nightmares.

Aperture Science is falling into chaos. Everything is noise and destruction and pain. Many of the scientists are already dead.

Neurotoxin is coming out of the walls, and no one can stop it.

The intercom is a battle between two voices, one male and one female and computerized.

“So many of you scientists have Nobel Prizes. It’s too bad none of you would win a prize for Being Immune to Neurotoxin,” the female voice says.

“Everyone, evacuate if you aren’t already dead. If you are, we’ll get your severance packages to your families. Unless your families are here too. Sorry about that. It’s really too bad.” That voice is Howard Stark, and Steve looks like he would punch him straight through the PA system if his hands weren’t occupied with holding the oxygen mask to his face.

“I’m going to get things done around here, and none of you useless meat sacks are going to get in my way!” the female voice interjects, louder than before.

“I want to go on record,” Howard begins to talk over her, and he has to stop and cough. Bucky’s eyes widen. If not even Howard Stark is safe from the neurotoxin, how long can the rest of them last? “I want to say that when I die in about five minutes, I want my son Anthony Stark to be in charge. This place always oughtta be run by a Stark! Stark men are made of iron!”

“Iron rusts,” says the female voice, cool and almost earsplittingly loud. Bucky hopes Tony got out in time.

Sarah Rogers runs up to Steve and Bucky, oxygen mask clutched over her own mouth and nose, and she has desperate relief in her eyes.

“Come on, come with me,” she instructs. The mask muffles her words, and Steve and Bucky chase after her down the hall. Steve keeps his feet, but Bucky stumbles when an explosion rocks the facility, catching himself hard on the palm of his hand. He scrambles to his feet and blinks back tears, clenching his left fist to hide the bleeding of his skinned palm.

They run down one hallway and then another, changing direction when the ceiling caves in on them, and eventually they make it into Sarah Rogers’ lab. She throws open a locked cabinet and pulls out a vial and a hypodermic needle, and then she turns back to them. Bucky knows, instinctively, what it’s for; oxygen masks can’t last forever.

“Oh, God, my children, I am so sorry.” She’s crying now, and Bucky’s terrified because he has never seen Sarah Rogers cry in his entire life. She’s the strongest person he’s ever known, except maybe Steve. “I’m so sorry,” she repeats. “There’s only enough for one of you.”

“Give it to Steve,” Bucky says immediately.

“No, don’t, give it to Bucky—“ Steve says hotly, but he’s ignored. Sarah Rogers and Bucky are having a conversation with their eyes that Steve isn’t a part of. Sarah says I’m sorry and I love you also, and Bucky says I know but we both love him more.

Sarah kisses Bucky’s forehead and gives the injection to Steve.

Bucky’s hand is really stinging now, burning really, more than a simple scraped palm would cause, but he doesn’t care, because Steve’s going to be safe. Whatever Sarah Rogers was working on will save him. They keep running when the lab catches on fire and Sarah Rogers brings them to an ominous windowless door labeled Relaxation Vault.

“If I put you in with the test subjects, the facility should keep you safe. It prioritizes testing over everything else,” she says bitterly.

“Ma—“ Steve says. “Ma, it hurts.”

“I know, baby,” she says, and she pulls him into a hug. It’s the last time they’ll ever touch. She pulls Bucky in, too, holding both of her children tightly while the facility crashes down around them.

Then she lets go.

The pain is spreading up Bucky’s arm, and he knows that the neurotoxin in the air has gotten into his wound, but he doesn’t care. He doesn’t say anything. Steve will be safe.

Sarah Rogers shuts Steve into one chamber of the Relaxation Vault, and Bucky into another, and then the world goes dark.

Bucky wakes screaming.

*

“Howard Stark made her,” Rhodey tells him one day. “Determination Core, he called her. Hah. Supposed to, and I quote, ‘get the job done no matter what.’”

“What job?” Bucky asks him, leaning back against the wall. In this shadowy corner, the cool green light from Rhodey’s lens is soothing, a relief after the hot orange ambient light of the rest of the maintenance passages.

“That was the problem, I guess,” Rhodey says, with an electronic whistle like a sigh. “No one ever told her what the job was supposed to be, so she just looked into Aperture’s records, found a lot of testing and a lot of deaths, and made her best estimate. The scary thing is how far off she’s not.”

“You mean, Aperture was always like this?” Bucky says, feeling kind of crushed. As a child, he had rather idolized Aperture Science and all the discovery and progress it symbolized to him.

“No, not this bad,” Rhodey rushes to reassure him. “Just… a few priorities out of order. I bet you like those Long Fall Boots.”

“Sure,” Bucky agrees. They’re both comfortable and life-saving.

“Howard Stark described them as ‘a foot-based suit of armor for the portal device.’ They weren’t originally meant to protect you,” Rhodey says, as though that weren’t clear already. Bucky doesn’t really feel reassured.

“That sounds about this bad,” he says.

“Maybe it does,” Rhodey allows, “but there weren’t nearly this many casualties until Sunset—that’s Determination Core—took control of the facility. Ought to have called her Ruthlessness Core instead.”

“What about IRoN?” Bucky asks. “I guess she created him to run the tests?”

“No, not at all. I can’t access the full records,” Rhodey says with disappointment, “but it seems like IRoN was Tony’s last-ditch effort to override Sunset before… before.”

Bucky tries not to imagine what happened after Rhodey’s before. Tony had been charming and sweet and Bucky had been really looking forward to getting to know him better. He doesn’t like to think of Tony alone in the control center, trying to scramble a new core into the mainframe and choking on neurotoxin all the while. He doesn’t like to think that he’ll never see Tony again, or Steve, or Sarah Rogers, or anyone but Rhodey and his green light.

“There’s gotta be something we can do,” he says, because he needs something else to think about.

“Not you or me,” Rhodey says. “Neither of us can run a facility this size. You’re, well, human, and I…” he sounds just a little sheepish. “I was created for human social interaction and mechanical engineering. I’ve learned since then—electrical engineering was great, and computer engineering was kind of a must—but I just don’t have the scope or the OS to take over a facility of this size from Determination Core.”

“Who does?” Bucky asks, but then he answers his own question. “Management Core, right? That’s gotta be what she’s made for.”

“Pepper could handle anything,” Rhodey agrees. “I’ve got some old schematics around here somewhere; what say we head for Personality Core Production?”

“Sounds good to me,” Bucky says, and they set off.

*

The path to Personality Core Production doesn’t even begin to resemble a straight line. It doubles back on itself, twists and turns, goes up and down dozens of levels, and sometimes stops dead. It helps that Bucky has the portal gun still—it gets them out of more than a few dead ends and close shaves—but there’s a limit to what he can do. On the other hand, there seems to be virtually no limit to what IRoN can do. He rearranges walls, testing chambers, and whole sections of facility whenever he gets the slightest hint that Bucky and Rhodey might be there.

It’s very clear that he’s hunting them.

So Bucky just moves faster and hopes that IRoN doesn’t have enough specific information to figure out what they’re intending to do, or that if he does, he can’t shut down or destroy Management Core before they get there.

*

There is a sound like an echo in the passageway. When Bucky walks and runs, he can hear the sound of footsteps behind him. It would make sense that the clang of the Long Fall Boots on the metal catwalks would carry through the facility, but…

The sound isn’t something Bucky heard earlier, and he likes to think that he would have noticed if there had always been an echo like this.

So either he didn’t notice that this echo was there all along, or it wasn’t there all along, and now something—or someone—is following them. Bucky doesn’t know which of those possibilities is eerier to think about.

Okay, that’s a lie. It’s the second one. The second one is utterly terrifying.

*

Bucky has more than a few vivid nightmares about androids and automatons built by IRoN and sent into the maintenance passages to hunt him down. The reality, when it catches up with them—quite literally—is much less dramatic.

He’s sleeping sitting up in an office chair with Rhodey on watch when he’s woken by a little hiss, a little shift in light as Rhodey rolls on the ancient, rickety desktop, bumping into Bucky’s right arm to wake him up. He’s alert in the space of a few seconds, eyes snapping open and heart rate elevating instantly, but he doesn’t move. Rhodey shifts just slightly, just enough to gesture in the direction of the passage they’d come from.

There are steps, distinct now, and definitely not an echo. Someone, or something, is coming. Bucky curls his left hand into a fist and raises the portal gun with his right. It may not be a weapon, but IRoN had been clear enough that the operative end of the gun was not safe to touch. He's interested to find out why.

The steps get more careful as they get closer, slower and lighter like whoever’s making them is walking on tiptoe. Bucky makes his breathing slower, deeper, and just a little louder, trying to lure the other in with the promise of a helpless, sleeping Bucky. Rhodey has gone very still, his lens focused on the entryway to the little chamber.

And then Steve peers around the corner.

“Steve!” Bucky exclaims, springing up and abandoning the element of surprise entirely. He drops the portal gun on the desk.

“Bucky?” Steve asks, and wait, what’s up with his voice? It’s deeper, fuller somehow, like he’s got more air to work with, and Bucky is very confused until Steve steps into full view and he’s enormous and Bucky can’t help but jump back, startled and not a little scared.

“What happened to you? Is it even really you?”

IRoN couldn’t do that, could he? He couldn’t make some kind of android to pretend to be Steve. That had to be beyond his capabilities.

“Yes, of course it’s me,” Steve says. “What happened to your arm, Bucky?”

“Nuh uh,” Bucky says dumbly. “You go first.”

“I’ll second that,” Rhodey says from the table. He remembers Steve too, Bucky realizes. He’s just as confused about Steve’s sudden eight-inch jump in height.

“It was that injection that Ma gave me,” Steve explains. “Made me immune to the neurotoxin and the Relaxation Vault’s drugs, and had some other… benefits.”

“I can’t believe you’re still alive,” Bucky breathes. “It seemed like it had been such a long time, when I woke up everything looked old—“

“Bucky,” Steve says very gently. “It has been a long time.”

“What are you saying?” No, no, no, Bucky’s mind is freezing up and he tries not to tremble.

“Well, that’s one of those benefits. I’m, uh, older than I look,” Steve says, sounding sheepish. Bucky steps in closer to him and raises a shaking right hand to his face, holding it a hairsbreadth away, terrified that the moment he touches him Steve will vanish into mist like a mirage. Steve just holds still and waits to see what Bucky’s going to do, and that more than anything sells his story.

The Steve that Bucky knew was never this patient. He was never willing to wait for anything, never able to sit still for more than a few minutes at a time, and only then when he was drawing. Bucky looks up and swallows heavily when he sees years in Steve’s eyes, years of age and experience and loneliness that aren’t reflected in the rest of his new and improved body. He drops his hand. He can’t bring himself to touch this new Steve, different all over, changed. Does he even remember the way they used to be? Could a man—and Steve is a man now, not the boy Bucky once fell for—like him even want one patchworked together like Bucky?

“Bucky?” Steve says, concerned. “Are you okay?”

“No, I’m not okay,” Bucky says. His voice breaks. “I—I got an arm made outta metal and I’m fulla IRoN’s testing drugs and I got—I got half a mind at best, I’m missin’ so much and I can’t remember and you’re different and I…” He feels like he’s shrinking in on himself, all the fight going out of him. “D’you even need me anymore?”

“Buck,” Steve says softly, almost reproachfully. “Hey. It’s okay. So we’re both different. Doesn’t matter to me. I missed you every day.”

“Really?” Bucky asks, and he hates how weak it sounds.

“Maybe I don’t need you to pull me outta scrapes anymore,” Steve says, and he puts his hand on the side of Bucky’s neck, making him gasp. This is real, the touch says. Steve is real and he’s right there and he’s touching Bucky. “Doesn’t mean I don’t want you with me anyways. I always want that.”

Bucky smiles helplessly, a reflexive reaction to being wanted.

“I missed you, too,” he says. “I thought for sure… but it doesn’t matter now. I liked the art,” he offers, trying another little smile on for size.

Steve’s answering smile is like the sunrise, and Bucky basks in it.

“So I’m guessing you’re on board with the plan to destroy IRoN and take the facility back,” Rhodey says dryly from the table, and Bucky startles hard. He’d almost forgotten Rhodey was still there, so distracted by the whole Steve being alive thing.

Which. Steve is alive. It’s a pretty big thing.

“Sounds like a good plan,” Steve answers, and he doesn’t jump at all. The bastard. “I know the place pretty well by now… where are we headed?”

“Personality Core Production,” Rhodey answers, and Bucky scoops him up from the table.

“Lead the way,” Bucky says, and Steve does.

It feels good, following Steve again.

*

Steve does know the way around; he doesn’t have any schematics like Rhodey does, but he has years of experience with the ways IRoN tends to move things around. Rhodey can tell them which way they ought to be going; Steve can guess detours and dead ends that might’ve been created, and get them back on the right track. Steve has somehow fit an entire heap of art supplies into his pack, along with a whole other heap of food, and he has an encyclopedic knowledge of all the places to come by safe water.

And on top of everything else, Steve knows about IRoN. Not everything, not about the beginning like Rhodey does, but a lot.

“I saw him once,” Steve explains, while he and Bucky walk. "I got into the vents near the control center. There’s a massive superstructure connecting the cores to the mainframe of the entire facility.”

“Cores?” Bucky asks.

“Yeah, there are four of them,” Steve answers. Bucky remembers Steve’s painting from so long ago, the three cores surrounding the one in the center. That makes four. Had that been a painting of IRoN?

Bucky can identify three of the cores now: red, orange, and yellow must be Determination, Reward, and Curiosity. He can see how they would feed into each other, feed on each other, to cause IRoN to be the lethal monstrosity that he is. The one thing he doesn’t get is—

“Who’s the blue core?” he asks.

“You saw the painting?” Steve returns. He sounds pleased, and Bucky smiles a little.

“Do you mean Yinsen?” Rhodey asks, rolling in his housing to look up at them. Bucky’s gotten better at reading Rhodey’s mechanical “facial expressions” and he thinks this one means that Rhodey is confused, curious, or concerned, or maybe some combination of those things.

“No, the blue is too dark for that,” Bucky says. He remembers Yinsen telling him to calm down while he replaced Bucky’s left arm, damaged beyond repair.

“I don’t know,” is what Steve says. He sounds disappointed in himself. “I only got a quick look. He’s IRoN’s voice, but he doesn’t seem to get any decision-making power. From what I saw, the others tell him what to do, or just override him and act through him. Determination Core shouted a lot of abuse. I think… I can’t be sure, but I think he might’ve been trying to fight them.”

“Besieged,” Bucky murmurs to himself. The word seems even more apt now.

“That makes sense,” Rhodey adds. “All I know is that Tony tried to make IRoN—or whatever that blue core is—to try to get control back from Determination Core.”

“Do you remember Tony?” Bucky asks, a little afraid of the answer.

“Of course,” Steve says. “Not as well as I remember you, but he was very… memorable. Rhodey gave us a shovel talk,” he remembers.

“Yeah,” Rhodey sighs. “I miss him.”

They all do. They walk on in silence for a while, quietly sad together. They have a mission, though, so they don’t let themselves focus on being sad for too long.

*

“What the hell’s that?” Bucky demands, looking up the dark corridor ahead at the dozens of laser turret sights aimed all over the room. All at once it feels like he just got out of the testing chambers again, like he’s barely had even a taste of freedom and now he’s going to be shot—

“Don’t worry about it, it’s safe,” Steve assures him.

“Those are turrets—“

“Not ones that work.”

“Oh,” Rhodey interjects. “Oh, yep, there it is on the schematics. Steve’s right. That’s a Turret Redemption Line up ahead, where they send all the defective ones to be destroyed. The ones that don’t have casing, or don’t have ammo, or don’t have the guts to shoot anybody…”

“They’re actually kind of sweet,” Steve says.

“You’ve gotta be kidding me!” Bucky exclaims, throwing his hands up and seriously considering storming off. “Those killing machines are sweet?”

“I spent a couple hours hanging out with one that was perfectly normal, except that he’d come out with a Boston accent, which is apparently grounds for being “defective.” He was very friendly,” Steve says, perfectly serious.

“You’ve gotta be kidding me,” Bucky repeats, but he follows after Steve anyway. “You are—you’re—“

“A punk?”

“The biggest punk.”

Steve smiles at him, and Bucky feels all the frustration in his chest melting into a puddle of pleased goo. Goddamn ridiculous emotions. Why’d he have to go and fall in love with this idiot, anyway?

The hallway opens up into a huge cavernous space like a factory floor, with two large conveyor belts strung over an abyss, bringing the skeletons of a hundred failed turrets to the incinerator on the left side of the room. Bucky can feel the heat, even from here. Now that he’s in the room—the Turret Redemption Line—it’s easy to see that these turrets aren’t functional. Most of them are missing pieces, and very few of them are actually lit up. Some of their lasers flash, and one of them flickers between a dozen different neon colors like it thinks it’s at a rave. A few of them speak in different accents. One of them yips and pants like a dog.

It’s much more sad than scary.

“We have to cross the room,” Steve says, and Bucky looks up from the conveyor belts. At the far side of the room, at the top of a tall, rickety stair, there is a door that says EXIT very plainly. It does seem like the way to go.

The wall next to the door, unfortunately, is grey cinderblock that won’t hold a portal. Bucky looks all around for any of the smooth, white-paneled walls he usually uses to place portals, and he finds that this room is almost completely devoid of them. The only white panels he can see are on the wall, high over the place where the first conveyor belt comes out of the wall, bringing in broken turrets from places unknown on the other side. Bucky aims and fires the blue portal up there, and places the orange one on the wall beside him. Most of the hallways are portal friendly.

Then, he realizes the problem with his plan.

“Steve, I can land that drop easy, but you’re gonna break an ankle at the very least,” Bucky says.

“No problem,” Steve says. “I’ll just jump.”

“Jump?” Bucky exclaims.

“Jump,” Steve agrees. And he does—he backs up to get a running start, sprints four steps and then leaps high into the air, soaring and graceful and staying up far, far too long. It makes Bucky’s head swim, just a little, remembering the skinny little asthmatic who had to sit out half the activities in gym class.

“Whoa,” he breathes.

“Who needs Aerial Faith Plates?” Rhodey snorts, amused.

“Hurry up!” Steve calls, jogging in place to stay where he is on the conveyor belt. Bucky hefts Rhodey into a more secure grip and jumps through the orange portal at his side, falling immediately out of the blue one. The Long Fall Boots reorient him with a lurch and then he lands with a thud beside Steve.

“How do we get to the next one?” Bucky wonders, already looking around. The second conveyor belt is further away from them than the first had been from the entrance. He runs up and down the whole length of the conveyor belt he’s on, looking around at the rest of the room. There, he finally sees—there’s a single white panel on the ceiling, high above the second conveyor belt.

“I can’t jump quite that far,” Steve says, looking at the distance to the other belt.

“I don’t think either of you thought this through,” Rhodey says, sounding like he’d roll his eyes if he could.

“Can you jump back?” Bucky asks him. A plan is forming in his mind.

“Sure,” Steve says.

“Can you throw me back?” he continues, firing a new blue portal onto that white ceiling panel.

“I see what you’re doing,” Steve realizes, looking at Bucky’s portals. “I gotcha.”

“It doesn’t matter how you throw me, the boots’ll land me right side up.”

“I know.”

They go to the far end of the conveyor belt, where it begins coming out of the wall, and get themselves into position. Steve laces his fingers together tightly, and then Bucky plants his boot on top. Carefully, making sure his balance is steady on Steve’s hands, Bucky lifts his other boot up off of the conveyor belt, crooking his knee to keep the weight in close to his body. He curls metal fingers around Rhodey so that there’ll be no chance of dropping him.

Bucky closes his eyes. From this angle, he can’t see where he’s going anyway. He’ll just have to trust Steve to time it right to land him in the hallway.

Then, all at once, Steve surges into motion, putting his whole body into the throw. His hands push upward and Bucky springs off as hard as he can. He opens his eyes just in time to see the ceiling rushing past him as the Long Fall Boots spin him into a neat backflip and land him solidly in the hallway they came from.

Bucky gives Steve a thumbs up, and Steve jumps after him.

“The two of you are going to make me motion sick,” Rhodey complains, “and I don’t even have a stomach.”

“Just one more time,” Steve assures him. “Here, I’ll hold you and the portal gun, and Buck can hold onto my legs.”

Steve climbs onto Bucky’s back in one elegant motion, and Bucky wraps his arms tightly around Steve’s thighs to keep him in place. Steve’s massive thighs. Bucky still can’t get his head around it.

For one brief, fierce instant, he misses the skinny little boy with everything he has in him.

Then Steve leans down to kiss Bucky’s temple sweetly and tell him that he’s ready to jump, and Bucky decides that the enormous full-grown man is pretty alright, too. It’s just a lot to get used to, is all.

Not that Bucky doesn’t like the muscles. He does. A lot.

He thinks he should probably not think about the muscles right now, though. Bucky shelves that thought for a later date and squeezes Steve’s thighs against him—for practical reasons, of course—and jumps through the portal. The wind rushes in his ears and his stomach flips when the boots reorient him, but he’s used to it.

Steve isn’t. He shrieks, just a little bit. He might’ve thrown up, before the injection. Bucky just laughs as they land lightly on the second conveyor belt.

“Is there any chance you’ll ever let that go?” Steve pleads, climbing down. “I’ve never used Long Fall Boots before!”

“It’s cute that you think I might say yes,” Bucky drawls, trying on his best smirk. It feels kind of nice to wear it again, he thinks. He guesses it’s been a while since he last put it on. “Rhodey?”

“Storing audiofile as we speak,” Rhodey says, and really, this is why he’s Bucky’s favorite.

“And I can’t convince you—“ Steve breaks off suddenly.

“I’m different,” says a high, sweet, computerized voice. “I’m different.”

“It’s a broken turret,” Bucky says. “What’s the big deal?”

“It’s a turret that knows it’s different,” Rhodey says, rolling in his housing to look for the source of the voice. “That never happens.”

“Usually, the defective turrets just think they’re being sent off to another part of the factory. They don’t realize that there’s anything different about them,” Steve explains.

“Right,” Bucky says. “Your turret with the Boston accent.”

Just then, Rhodey’s green light falls on the casing of the turret that had spoken. It looks completely ordinary, white casing and black tripod legs, but it focuses when it sees them and says thank you when Steve picks it up. They bring it over to the side of the conveyor belt, where even Bucky can easily jump the distance to the platform at the bottom of the stairs to the exit door.

“Prometheus was punished by the gods for giving the gift of knowledge to man. He was cast into the bowels of the earth and pecked by birds,” the turret informs them.

“That’s nice,” Bucky says.

“It’s definitely different,” Rhodey agrees.

“It won’t be enough,” the turret says, like this is a completely new topic.

“You’re disturbing,” Rhodey tells the turret.

“Do you think it means something? Or is it just nonsense?” Steve wonders, half to himself. “Don’t look at me like I’m crazy—the turrets are made by the Aperture facility just as much as the Personality Cores are. It’s not too far fetched to think that one of them might’ve seen something, or know something, that we have no idea about. Who knows how much IRoN might be involved in turret production?”

“His name is Anthony,” the turret says placidly, and Steve drops it like it’s on fire. It falls into the abyss with a sound suspiciously like wheee.

*

None of them says another word until they’ve left the Turret Redemption Line far, far behind.

“You don’t think…” Steve says, breaking the silence.

“I don’t know. I don’t know,” Rhodey says blankly. All at once his light intensifies and he bursts out, “Goddamn it, I knew I should have spent more time in the lab with him! I used to be in there all the time, but then he built Maya, and she was just for exactly that purpose, and she was smarter than me, and—if I hadn’t been so busy feeling jealous and wondering if he was replacing me, I’d know what he’d been working on.”

“But you think it’s possible? That he’s… that Tony is IRoN?” Steve asks. It sounds like he’s afraid to say it so plainly, as if the words will make it true.

“I don’t know.” Rhodey says again. His lens cover slides completely shut for a moment, plunging them into darkness as Rhodey makes a staticky sound like a sigh. “He was a genius. Is a genius. Between the two of them… I wouldn’t put anything past them.”

“So he… he put himself into a core, tried to stop Determination Core, and then she… what, corrupted him?” Steve wonders.

“No!” Bucky shouts, finding his voice at last.

“Bucky?” Rhodey says carefully. “I don’t want to believe it either, but…”

“No,” he repeats, shaking slightly.

“Bucky, he was testing you,” Steve says gently, putting a hand on Bucky’s shoulder, as if he needs reassurance. Bucky hates that it steadies the tremors running through his body.

“And you said it looked like he was resisting the other cores,” Bucky snaps. “You said it didn’t look like he’s got control. Steve, I know you been runnin’ from him longer than me, but please. We gotta save him.”

“If it’s possible,” Rhodey says, “then we have to try. Maybe Pepper will be able to remind him of who he used to be.”

“Alright, we’ll try,” Steve relents.

Bucky just thinks of the strange turret saying it won’t be enough and he feels a sick sense of foreboding in his stomach.

*

They don’t talk much anymore, as they keep on traveling towards Personality Core Production. Bucky doesn’t like this feeling of being at odds with Steve, but he likes what it means even less.

As far as he can remember, Bucky has always been the reasonable one. The down-to-earth one. The one with his head stuck firmly on his shoulders, the one with sense. There have been a lot of comments, over the years, he remembers. A lot of people saying the same thing different ways.

Bucky thinks he used to be pretty cynical.

(His adoration of science fiction excepted, of course.)

And Steve, on the other hand, was the dreamer. The idealist. The boy with his head in the clouds and his nose in his sketchbook, one foot in a dream and the other barely tiptoeing through the real world.

So this situation feels uncomfortably like a role-reversal, Bucky hoping for the best in Tony and Steve already resigned to the worst. Bucky knows where his hope comes from; it comes from the flutter in his gut and the heart-wrenching sense of familiarity that struck him every time IRoN spoke, even back in the Enrichment Center testing chambers before Bucky even knew himself. He has to believe that that feeling, like he knew IRoN down to his bones, meant something. That it still means something.

But Bucky doesn’t know what happened to make Steve so hopeless, and it terrifies him.

*

The door to Personality Core Production is sealed shut, and Bucky can’t pry it open and Steve can’t kick it down, so they just sit and wait while Rhodey tries to hack it. He keeps cursing in a quiet, staticky way that Bucky thinks would be under his breath if he were human.

“Aha!” Rhodey exclaims after several minutes. “Pepper’s good, but she likes me too much. There’s always a backdoor, just for me,” he explains excitedly. Then he sobers suddenly. “Used to be, she’d leave a backdoor for Tony, too. I bet she’s learned her lesson by now… I really hope she’s okay.”

“Me too,” Steve says reassuringly, and he picks Rhodey up. The three of them go through the door together.

“Stop right there!” a sharp voice commands, and they all do, automatically. “I don’t know how you got in, but you’re going to start talking fast. There’s a Vital Apparatus Vent right over your heads and I can get any number of turrets and toxins diverted here within fifteen seconds. Fourteen. Thirteen.”

“Pepper, Pep, stop!” Rhodey shouts. “It’s me, it’s Rhodey.”

“Rhodey?” A core with a pink light slides smoothly into view on the Management Rail set into the ceiling. “It is you! Where have you been? Are you alright?”

“I’m fine, I just got myself stuffed into a Weighted Companion Cube for testing. Apparently encouraging dissent against IRoN is a discouraged behavior,” Rhodey says wryly.

“Apparently,” Pepper says, amused. “And who are these humans?”

“You remember,” Rhodey says. “Bucky and Steve. Those two troublemakers who came to seduce our boy all those years ago.”

“We didn’t seduce—“ Steve protests.

“Ah, yes, I remember now,” Pepper cuts him off. “They’re still alive?”

“Of course,” says a new voice, lightly accented. A pale blue core comes into the room on a second Management Rail. “The giant one is Sarah Rogers’ boy. It seems her work has done its job, and then some.”

“Yinsen?” Bucky says. “Thank you.”

“For—oh, your arm. Indeed. You’re welcome, of course,” Yinsen says modestly, “but there’s really no need to thank me. It was the right thing to do. I couldn’t let Sarah’s efforts to save you be wasted.”

“Was my Ma…?” Steve begins, sounding unwilling to finish the question.

“Lost, I’m afraid. So many good people were lost that day,” Yinsen says mournfully, as though every loss affects him personally.

“And some bad ones,” Pepper adds fiercely. “I’d never tell Tony this if he were alive, of course, but Howard Stark deserved what he got.”

“About that,” Rhodey says. “Do you think it’s possible Tony and Maya figured out a way to upload him into a Personality Core?”

“What?” Pepper says blankly, stunned.

“There’s a possibility that he’s part of the group of cores that make up IRoN. I don’t like to think about what he must’ve been going through if it’s true,” Rhodey says. “I wouldn’t put it past him, though.”

“No, neither would I,” Pepper answers. Her lens cover closes and she makes a sound like she’s in pain. “I can’t even imagine what it must be like, to be a human mind trapped in a body that isn’t fit for it, and on top of that to be subjected to that—that—Determination Core monstrosity. We have to help him. Do you have a plan?”

“Uh, we were thinkin’ it might help him to have a few friends back, miss,” Bucky says. He sounds shier than he hoped, but she’s… well, this Management Core sounds like quite the woman. The kind you could never call a girl, the kind you called by her last name if you knew it.

“You’re sweet,” Pepper tells him, and he fights a flush. “Of course I’ll help. I just have to shut down the production line so it doesn’t turn out more of those monsters while I’m unable to monitor it.”

“You take your time there,” Rhodey says with a little shudder.

“Anthony and I were never close friends, but…” Yinsen begins hopefully. Steve and Bucky turn to Rhodey.

“Hey, I’m not about to turn down help,” Rhodey says. “You two are about to run out of hands, though.”

Bucky smiles, and takes Yinsen down from the rail with his left hand. It feels oddly fitting, to hold the core who saved him in the hand he was given. Steve takes Pepper in his other hand as soon as she says she’s finished the shutdown.

“I know a short path to the control center,” Pepper says, and then she makes a sound like a snort. “I keep trying to make it longer, or to cut it off entirely, but IRoN just rebuilds it every week or so. Yeah, I know a short path. Any money says it’s monitored.”

“Do you think, between the three of you, you can shut down IRoN’s surveillance?” Steve asks, in a very commanding I’m-making-a-plan kind of voice.

“We’ll see what we can do,” Rhodey says.

They set off. With a portal gun in one hand, a generous, compassionate core in the other, and three more friends at his side, Bucky feels almost ready for what must be ahead.

*

“Look, I’m sorry,” Steve says, once they’ve settled in to get some rest. The cores are off to the side, to keep watch and to plan while the humans sleep, and Steve’s voice is low, meant for Bucky alone.

Bucky looks up at him, but doesn’t say anything.

“I know you remember him better than I do, and I know you think I’m being… unfair about him,” Steve carries on. “But I’m not sure how much of him is left, and I don’t want you to get hurt trying to save IRoN. Please, Bucky.”

“You don’t understand,” Bucky mutters.

“So explain it to me,” Steve pleads. The earnest expression on his face loosens Bucky’s tongue almost against his will.

“I met him, and it was like I knew him right away,” Bucky says. “Like I’d already known him for years. The whole future unrolled right in fronta me. I could see us bein’ together for years and years, figuring out every problem, staying together come what may. Y’know. An’ I’ve only… I’ve only felt like that twice in my life, and the first time was when I met you, Stevie. You gotta understand.”

“I do understand,” Steve says. He looks hurt, and his eyes are shining. “It mighta been a long time ago, but I remember that feeling. Unforgettable, that. It’s just—“

“Yeah, I know, you think that guy we met is gone,” Bucky says, rolling over to put his back to Steve. “Thing is, I was gone too. And I came back. You gotta give him that chance. That’s what’s not fair.”

Steve doesn’t say anything else, and Bucky doesn’t turn to look at him. They sleep.

*

The next day, they’re walking down an endless corridor when Pepper informs them that the control center is right up ahead. Steve’s hands are full, but Bucky feels a scuff of Steve’s toe against his ankle, asking for his attention, and he turns expectantly.

“Bucky, I’m sorry,” Steve says, and it sounds a lot more like he means it this time. There’s real regret in his voice, at the very least.

“Yeah?” Bucky says hopefully. He hates being mad at Steve.

“Yeah,” Steve says. “I’m… I’m gonna give him that chance, okay? I know I wasn’t there to help you come back, but I’ll be there for him.”

“Thank you,” Bucky says.

“We good?” Steve asks, big blue puppy dog eyes boring into Bucky’s. Well, that’s cheating. He knows Bucky could never resist that look.

“Yeah, we’re good.”

Relief settles into Bucky like he was waiting for it, and he sighs, relaxes. Yeah, that’s what was missing before. Now he’s ready to face IRoN.

*

“You know what’s pathetic? You’ve got all the resources of the entire Aperture Science facility at your disposal, and you can’t even find one measly human. A human that you let loose, I might add.”

“One hundred thousand dollars. One hundred and one thousand dollars. One hundred and two thousand dollars. One hundred and three—“

“Yes, that’s helpful. That’s how much money you’ve wasted on that stupid little project of yours while that test subject runs around and does God knows what to our maintenance systems. I hope he shuts you down, you’d deserve it after this pathetic episode. What’s your name again? Bad Idea Core? Failure Core?”

“Why do the humans continue testing when the tests violate survival instincts? Why do solved puzzles encourage future puzzle efforts? Why do humans seek to carry on while at system limits? How can human system limits be improved? What causes human motivation?”

“One hundred and six thousand dollars. One hundred and seven thousand dollars.”

“Oh, I know, Fuck-up Core, is that it?”

“I-It’s Resilient Core…”

“What’s that supposed to mean, again? Do tell. I’m so fascinated to know how you think you built a personality out of an adjective that isn’t even a proper description. I suppose that’s only fitting, though, a meaningless name for a worthless core. Why don’t you just do your job, you moron, and find that human already?”

“One hundred and nine thousand dollars. One hundred and ten thousand—“

“Why are different humans susceptible to different forms of encouragement? Why do humans respond illogically to puzzle situations? Why is human perception inconsistent with—“

“Oh, you two can just shut up! Can’t you see you’re distracting Moron Core over here? Besides, neither of you two do any real work around here—“

“Who is at the door?”

“What?”

“Who is at the door?”

“Oh. I guess I had to find that human for you, you idiot. Well, let’s say hello, why don’t we? I’ll warm up the neurotoxin.”

*

Bucky sets his jaw as he listens to the voices within the control center. Now that he knows how to listen to it, it’s clear that one of the cores has Tony’s voice. It’s electronic and modulated because it no longer comes from a human throat, but it’s Tony all the same.

He’s going to save him. There is no other option, anymore. Not that there ever really was.

At his side, it looks like Steve is thinking much the same thing. It feels good to be in agreement again.

“Like we talked about,” Steve says, a reminder and an instruction, and all four of them make noises of assent. Steve’s plan is a good one, they think, and they’re going to follow through on it as best they can. Steve nods at them definitively, and pulls the door open.

*

As soon as the control center senses the presence of more cores, an automated, recorded voice comes on.

“Alternate cores detected. Would you like to initiate a central core transfer?”

“Yes,” Steve says clearly.

“Why?” Curiosity Core asks.

“One hundred and fifteen thousand dollars,” Reward Core says.

“Of course not,” Determination Core scoffs.

“No,” the blue core, Resilient Core, Tony, says in a voice that’s quiet but firm. It takes Bucky several seconds to realize why; Resilient Core doesn’t want Determination Core to have any greater share of power than she absolutely has to have.

“Yes!” Bucky says quickly, to even out the scale. Rhodey, Pepper, and Yinsen echo him.

“Stalemate detected. Transfer procedure cannot continue, unless a Stalemate Associate is present to press the Stalemate Resolution Button,” the recorded voice informs them. A panel opens in the wall, revealing a single red button on a pedestal.

“I’ve got the button,” Steve says hurriedly, setting Pepper and Rhodey down. The two of them immediately get to work hacking into IRoN’s controls, trying to stave off that neurotoxin. Bucky sets Yinsen beside them and hopes that they’ll be safe out of the way. “Buck, are you ready?”

Bucky squints at the wall and fires off two quick portals, one low down, the other very high.

“Ready,” he confirms.

“What do you even think you’re doing?” Determination Core says haughtily. You don’t think I’m going to let you get to that button, do you? I’ll crush you like a pancake before you even get within ten feet. I’ve got control of all the panels.”

“Let’s go,” Bucky says quickly, positioning himself with his back to the lower portal. Steve laces his fingers, just like he had on the Turret Redemption Line, and with one good thrust he flings Bucky through the portal with enough force that he goes flying out of the upper one. Bucky twists in his backflip and reaches out with his metal hand—

Bucky smashes into the superstructure hanging from the ceiling with a loud clang that shudders through his bones, not used to the force usually absorbed by the Long Fall Boots, but his metal hand isn’t fazed. It seizes instantly at the metal plates and cabling before it and digs in, anchoring Bucky securely in place while he shakes off the impact.

He looks down just in time to see a floor panel surge up and throw Steve back twenty feet from the button. Steve recovers admirably, but the ceiling panels seem to be shaking themselves loose from their anchored positions. If Bucky doesn’t act fast, that crushing possibility will be very much on the table in a few seconds.

“You don’t really think you’re going to do a manual central core transfer, do you? That’s adorable! But the central core is much too well protected for that. You won’t even get close to yanking out Disaster Core over there.”

“Yeah,” Bucky mutters, not really listening, “but what about the extraneous cores?”

Bucky shifts his grip to his right hand, and rips Determination Core out with his left. She screams, but he ignores her and throws her to the ground.

“Alert. A core has been removed from the control center. Please replace immediately. Please replace immediately.”

“Fat chance,” Bucky says, and he swings around to the other side of the superstructure, holding his body in close to it with his legs. “He doesn’t need you, either,” he hisses, tearing out Reward Core with prejudice. Might as well go for all three, he thinks, and yanks Curiosity Core, too. At this point, his leaning and climbing have carried him close to the bottom of the superstructure, where the blue light gleams like a water droplet about to fall from a stalactite. He’s practically upside down, but his Long Fall Boots are tucked securely into the structure, and his grip with his left hand is perfect.

“What’s going on?” says IRoN—no. It’s just Resilient Core, now. Just Tony.

“Hey, sweetheart,” Bucky whispers, holding himself steady with his face only a few inches from the beautiful light of the blue core. “You hangin’ in there alright?”

And Tony laughs. It’s staticky and electronic, but it still might be the most beautiful sound Bucky’s ever heard.

“Stalemate resolved,” the recorded voice says, and Bucky tilts his head and sees that Steve has finally reached the booby-trapped button and pressed it. “Central core transfer initializing. Please insert replacement core.”

“Just a second,” Steve tells the recording. “Bucky, you ready to catch?”

“Sure am,” Bucky says, releasing his right hand from its grip. Steve tosses Medical Core to him, and Bucky slots it into the space Reward Core had taken up. “Next?”

Steve throws him Encouragement Core, and Bucky feels a surge of poetic justice as he gives it Determination Core’s place. When Rhodey links with IRoN’s systems, a shudder goes through the entire superstructure.

“Oh,” Resilient Core sighs. “I remember you. I love you.”

“I love you too, Tones. Now let’s get you outta here. You’re a human, man, or have you forgotten?” Rhodey asks, and it sounds more serious than that question ever should.

“Okay,” Resilient Core answers.

Bucky drops to the floor. The Long Fall Boots bring him back to right side up and land him lightly beside Steve, who’s placing Pepper into a console rising from the floor.

“Replacement core accepted,” the voice says. “Central core transfer in progress.”

“That’s Pepper,” Resilient Core says, sounding less electronic. “I remember you, too. I didn’t expect you to be my friend. But I loved you, too.”

“I think I did a lot you didn’t expect, Tony,” Pepper says, “Not least that I loved you back. Come on out of there, sweetheart. Human minds aren’t meant for this kind of scope.”

The console lifts up from the floor and an arm extends from it, extracting Resilient Core from the superstructure and putting Management Core in his place. Pepper makes a sound like a sigh as she settles in.

“Ugh, there’s so much junk in here,” she complains, pink light flickering as she twists from side to side as though that’ll help her see the corrupted code better. “It’ll take me ages to clear out all of this mess!”

“If anyone can do it, it’s you, Pep,” Rhodey says.

“You’re probably right,” Pepper says, more plaintive than immodest. “Well, no time like the present. I better get started.”

“Additional core required,” the recorded voice says.

“You won’t get anything done without me!” Determination Core yells from where Bucky dropped her to the floor. “You have to put me back in, see!”

“I think I’ll start by clearing out that trash,” Pepper says. At the side of the room, an Emergency Intelligence Incinerator opens up. “Steve, darling, do you want to do the honors?”

“It’d be my pleasure,” Steve replies. Determination Core screams as she sails through the air and into the incinerator chute, and Reward Core is still spouting numbers as he follows after.

Carefully, Bucky takes Resilient Core from the mechanical arm slowly descending back into the floor. It’s kind of crazy, to think that he’s holding a human mind in his two hands, a human mind trapped in the body of a Personality Core. He holds it as gently as he would a human infant, even though he knows in his mind that Resilient Core must be as tough as Pepper and the other cores, at least physically.

“Should we burn this one, too?” Steve asks, picking up the yellow Curiosity Core.

“Why?” Curiosity Core asks. “Who are you? When can I do more science? What can I discover?”

“Don’t hurt her,” Resilient Core says, turning in Bucky’s hands. “Don’t hurt her.”

“Do you think you can… channel her properly?” Bucky asks Pepper. All he can think is that this core was made to help Tony, made to search out truth and discover, the way science was supposed to. In some way, Curiosity Core represents everything Bucky ever idolized about Aperture Science. Maybe, if she was directed properly, she could make Aperture something good.

“I think we can manage it, between the three of us,” Pepper says, and she uses the mechanical arm to lift Maya into place beside them.

“All cores accepted. Core transfer complete,” the recorded voice says.

They’re done. IRoN has been replaced with a stronger, more ethical combination of Intelligences. He and Steve are still alive, and Bucky has Resilient Core in his hands. Tony hasn’t spoken much, but Bucky thinks he’s very nearly himself again. They’ve accomplished everything they set out to do.

So why does he feel unfinished?

*

“Oh,” Pepper gasps after a few minutes. She’s been making little sounds, talking to herself every now and then as she and the others clear out some of the old programming left behind by Determination Core and the rest of IRoN.

“What is it?” Steve asks her. He keeps asking, although the answer is usually nothing important.

“It’s—there’s something in Maya’s storage banks,” she says, and this doesn’t sound like nothing important. Bucky looks up from his deep contemplation of the blue light of Resilient Core’s lens. He knows Resilient Core is looking back at him, and he doesn’t mind. “The Extremis Project. It looks like… oh, God. They kept Tony’s body in storage.”

“Is it…” Steve begins carefully, “Is it still viable?”

“It looks like they had to modify it,” Pepper says clinically. “It—he won’t be the same as you remember.”

“That’s okay,” Steve says wryly. “I don’t remember that well anyway.”

“As long as he’s okay,” Bucky says. He knows it isn’t good for Tony to be in a body that doesn’t suit him like this.

“Maya's additions to his biotechnological research seem to have made it very successful,” Yinsen says, apparently examining the same documents Pepper is. “Here, I can give you directions—“

“I remember the way,” Resilient Core says from Bucky’s lap. Bucky’s gaze snaps back down to him.

He realizes, all at once, that absolutely no one has asked Resilient Core what he wants to do.

“Resilient—I mean, Tony. What do you want?” Bucky asks gently. He puts a little steel into his spine and tries not to clench his hands on Tony’s casing; he has to be prepared to honor whatever choice Tony makes, even if it isn’t the one he wants.

“I want… I remember you two,” Tony says, looking at Bucky and then at Steve. “I liked you. You listened to me. You treated me like I was a kid like you.”

“None of us are kids anymore,” Bucky mutters. No, they’ve all lived too long and too hard since that Take Your Child to Work Day to be boys anymore. Even if Tony chooses to try to go back to his own body, they’ll never be those kids kissing like nothing matters ever again. It’ll never be that easy.

“I still like you,” Tony answers, and it’s so sweet that Bucky kind of wants to cry. “Let’s try it.”

*

Tony’s new body—Tony’s old body, but modified—is not quite human. His right hand has been replaced with shiny red metal, and some of his aging bones have been replaced with metal struts. A couple of his organs are synthetic. The heart in his chest is a flat blue circle that shines out through his shirt.

His eyes, when he opens them, cast bright blue light on Steve’s face, and then on Bucky’s when he turns to him.

“Hey,” Tony says shyly, and Bucky sees a glimpse of the brilliant, insecure boy he met so long ago. His voice is just a little bit electronic now, and his body is strung throughout with synthetics and wires, but he’s still in there somewhere. Bucky and Steve both smile at him. “You told me once that you wanted to see where this went,” he says, his voice a little too measured. “That still true?”

There is hope in his eyes, and his little smile is still so gorgeous it hurts. Bucky gasps, and Steve leans into him like he needs support, taking his hand. Tony’s bright, bright eyes are wide as he looks between the two of them. He looks like he wants them.

Steve kisses him first, soft and lingering, and then Bucky takes his turn. He teases Tony’s lips apart with his tongue, getting just the slightest taste of his mouth, and then he draws back. Tony’s smile is blinding.

Bucky thinks that maybe everything will be okay, after all.

*

They promise to come back, and Pepper builds them the tallest Unstationary Scaffold Aperture has ever seen. They take hands and climb on, and it rises slowly through the facility, past level after level of cleaned-up testing chambers and medical development labs. The turrets, peaceful now, are singing them goodbye.

All three of them are shaking. Bucky’s left hand is clicking against Tony’s right.

When they reach the surface, they take a collective deep breath. Steve pushes the door open, and they step out into a wide blue sky and a bronzed wheat field that looks like the sun reflected on the earth.

All Bucky sees is gold.