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~~~
“Ana! Jarvis!”
Five-year old Tony Stark raced into the kitchen excitedly, waving his left arm over his head.
Jarvis put a hand out, halting his charge. “Master Tony, what have we told you about running in the kitchen?”
Tony paused, thinking. “Um, that I shouldn’t do it, because I’ll run into somebody holding a knife and they might slip and cut my arm off.”
“More or less,” Ana agreed cheerfully, cutting vegetables at the counter... with the really big knife.
“Those may not have been my exact words, but yes, it would be in everyone’s best interests for you to be more cautious.”
“Okay, I’m sorry, but look!” Tony dismissed the admonition, still excited about showing off his discovery. He stuck his wrist under Jarvis’ nose. “I got my soulmate’s name!”
Jarvis blinked, gently taking Tony’s hand to look more closely at the letters scrawled on his wrist. “Oh. My.”
He’d been hoping for a more excited reaction, since Ana and Jarvis were the ones who had first told him about the name that appeared on people’s wrists, telling them who would love them forever. (They had each other’s names, of course.)
Ana gave him the reaction he was looking for, setting the knife down and turning toward him. “That’s wonderful, bogárkám! Who’s the lucky lady?”
She wandered over to look at Tony’s wrist, which Jarvis was still holding. Then her smile went away, and she and Jarvis looked at each other.
“What?” Tony asked, understanding that there was something wrong. “Is it a... bad name?”
Ana leaned down to hug him. “No, édesem, it’s a fine name.”
“It belonged to someone who would certainly have been worthy of being your soulmate,” Jarvis agreed.
Tony frowned. There was something wrong with the way Jarvis said that. “And they’re gonna be when I meet them, right?”
Jarvis didn’t answer, but Ana ruffled his hair and said, “Of course, bogárkám.”
~~~
After greeting Mrs. Rogers, Bucky headed into Steve’s room without knocking. He was surprised to see his friend sitting on the bed (well, mattress on the floor), staring at his bare wrist.
Bucky was even more startled to see the name upon that wrist.
Steve immediately pulled his shirt sleeve down over the soulmark, but it was too late. He looked up at Bucky, and his obstinate, “I can do this all day” expression came over his face, like he was looking at a bully instead of his best pal. “So now you know. It’s not going to be a problem, is it?”
Bucky realized his mouth was hanging open in shock. “Uh, no. I mean, I don’t want it to be, but I don’t really--wait, you knew?”
Steve’s jaw tightened, and he looked ready to fight a man twice his size--which really, Bucky almost was at this point. “What, that my soulmate’s a fella? Yeah, I’ve known for a while.”
Oh. That was why he was being all defensive. “No! That don’t bother me, Stevie. Especially ‘cause... well, mine is, too.” Bucky started to slide his sleeve up. “Thing is...”
He showed Steve his own wrist, and took in his friend’s shocked expression. “Looks like I’ve got the same fella for a soulmate.”
There on Bucky’s wrist, in a scrawl nearly identical to that on Steve’s, was the name Anthony Edward Stark.
~~~
Steve and Bucky grew excited over the idea of sharing a soulmate, though they sometimes argued over who would get to meet him first. Still, they discussed all the things they’d do with Anthony, how they’d all three live together in a mansion (they’d decided their soulmate would be rich) and snuggle on a plush sofa by a fireplace with the wealthy, handsome Anthony between them.
Before Bucky left to serve their country, they went to the World Expo to see the dashing Howard Stark. His flying car was impressive, even if it only hovered for a few seconds. The real disappointment was talking to him afterward and finding out he had no relatives named Anthony.
Steve hadn’t admitted it to Bucky, but part of the reason he wanted the chance to fight for his country was fear that Bucky would meet Anthony over there, and that their soulmate would realize Bucky was the only one he needed. Once he met someone as amazing as Bucky, what interest would Anthony have in a ninety-pound weakling who couldn’t even do his part to defend his country? So when Dr. Erskine approached him about the opportunity to change all that about himself, he leapt at the chance.
Then he got what he wanted, fighting alongside Bucky and doing his best to be someone their soulmate could love... and then Bucky fell.
Steve was in shock. He couldn’t stop thinking about about all their fantasies that would never come true, not because of the unrealistic expectations of living in a mansion, but because Bucky was gone.
“He never met Anthony,” he told Peggy numbly. (She’d been the only person they’d ever told about their shared--male--soulmate, when she’d revealed that her own soulmark was a woman’s name, Angie.) “We were supposed to...” The thought that Bucky might never get to meet their soulmate had never crossed his mind. “Now what am I supposed to do when I meet him?”
“Talk to him,” Peggy answered simply. “Tell him about the man he never got to know. And be happy with him, the way Barnes would want you to be.”
Steve took another swig of the liquor that tasted terrible and would never get him drunk, and didn’t reply.
~~~
Tony took an annoyed pleasure in the look of shock on Rhodey’s face when he saw Tony’s soulmark.
“Like... the war hero?”
“Yep,” Tony said shortly, not sure why he was being so aggressive about this. It’s not like his roommate had known how depressing his mark was when he asked about it. “The old, dead war hero.”
Rhodey shook his head. “So it’s someone named after him. Plenty of people do that.”
Tony shrugged. “Handwriting matches. What’s more likely, that someone with the exact same name signs it exactly the same way, or that my soulmate’s a dead man?”
“Fate wouldn’t do that to you.” Rhodey ignored Tony’s scoff at that. “You can’t just give up, Tones. You’ll find your soulmate.”
“You haven’t even met yours, how would you know?”
Rhodey looked down at his wrist, smiling slightly. “I have faith.” He looked back up at Tony. “Do some digging. You’ve got resources, use ‘em. You’ll find him, I know it.”
Tony ended up doing some digging after all.
“Bedford High School senior, in the Air Force Junior ROTC,” he told Rhodey as he entered their dorm room a couple weeks later.
Rhodey looked up in confusion, then smiled. “You found your soulmate?”
“Nope. Found yours.” Tony dropped a folder on the desk in front of his friend. “Carol Susan Jane Danvers.”
“Tony...” Rhodey looked down at the folder, unopened. Tony couldn’t tell if his friend was touched or angry at what he had done.
“Look, I just... You’re the one who cares about soulmates, so... Go meet her. Or wait until she graduates if you don’t want to creep on a high school student.”
“Says the fourteen-year-old who hit on me the day we met,” Rhodey said drily, but Tony was relieved to see him smiling as he opened the folder.
~~~
The Asset looked at the file.
Mission: Eliminate Howard Stark. Retrieve contents of case. Collateral damage acceptable to eliminate any witnesses.
Details were given on the target’s multiple addresses, his upcoming itinerary, and his family: a wife, Maria, and a son, Anthony.
Anthony Edward Stark.
That name meant something, but the Asset didn’t know what. He found himself glancing at his metal arm, but he wasn’t sure why.
“If the son is a witness, is he to be eliminated as well?”
“Of course,” his handler replied, a note of surprise and irritation in his voice.
Of course. The file said to eliminate any witnesses. No exceptions were given. Why had he questioned it?
The Asset looked at the folder again. Based on the itinerary, an assault while the man was driving from Long Island could minimize collateral damage. Anthony would not likely be in the car at the time.
Why did that matter?
All that mattered was completing the mission.
~~~
Steve’s first encounters with Tony Stark didn’t go well, and neither man brought up the topic of soulmarks. Then Tony flew a nuclear missile through a portal in the sky to save the world, and Steve almost lost the chance to find out if the abrasive, reckless, beautiful, courageous man was his soulmate.
After the team went out for shawarma, everyone took Tony up on his offer of guest rooms for the night. As exhausted as he was, Steve didn’t head to bed. Instead he followed Tony to the remains of his penthouse, where the man ignored the crushed floor and shattered glass to pour himself a drink from the bar.
“Need something, Cap?” Tony asked wearily when he realized he was being followed. “I told you JARVIS should be able to help you with anything you want.”
“I... I wanted to ask you...” Steve was too tired to decide how to phrase his question--he probably should have waited until they’d both had some sleep, but he didn’t want to delay this any longer--so he pushed up his sleeve and presented his wrist to Tony.
Tony only glanced at his own name on Steve’s wrist for a moment before turning back to the bar and downing another drink. “Yeah,” he said roughly. “Sorry your soulmate’s such a disappointment.”
Steve’s heart like it would burst with the confirmation. Soulmate. Mine. Then he heard the rest of what Tony--his Anthony, his soulmate--had said. “Tony, you’re not a disappointment. You’re a hero.”
Tony gave him a harsh smile. “Pretending to be, you mean.”
Steve flinched at the reminder of his own words on the helicarrier. “I shouldn’t have said those things. It was Loki’s staff, or--even if it wasn’t, I’m sorry. I was wrong. You proved that when you went through the portal.”
Tony winced and looked away.
After a moment of silence, Steve found himself asking, “Do you have any other soulmarks?”
Surprised brown eyes met his. “What?”
“Bucky...” Steve swallowed, still feeling the pain of his loss. “He had your name, same as me.”
“Sorry, don’t know what to tell you, Cap,” Tony said, pushing up his left sleeve. “I’ve only ever had your name.”
Steve stared at Tony’s exposed wrist. Steven Grant Rogers. He didn’t realize he was moving his arm until he’d placed his own bare wrist atop Tony’s, aligning their soulmarks.
Steve gasped, heard Tony do the same. He realized he’d closed his eyes, and he opened them to see a real smile on Tony’s face. He smiled back, suddenly grateful that life had brought him to this time.
Later, as Peggy had suggested so many years ago, Steve told Tony all about Bucky, the man he’d never known, even if he was never Tony’s soulmate.
Later, Steve found out that Bucky was alive.
~~~
“The Winter Soldier. Brainwashed, programmed to kill anyone Hydra wanted dead, stuck in a freezer between missions...” Steve looked like he was in shock. Or like he was going to be sick.
Tony couldn’t blame him. Finding out that your soulmate had been turned into a killing machine, forced to do terrible things while being treated as a tool instead of a human being?
Tony couldn’t even imagine.
“We’ll find her, Steve,” Tony promised. “We’ll find her, and get her help.”
Steve was silent for a moment, then asked in a quiet, heartbreaking voice, “But will she still be Peggy?”
Tony didn’t know how to answer that.
To make things worse, a tiny, terrible part of his brain was jealous. Because Steve’s soulmate might have been through hell, but she was, against all odds, alive. So was Steve.
The World War II hero Steve Rogers had crashed in the arctic seventy years before, but he was alive.
The World War II hero Peggy Carter had been presumed dead seventy years before, but she was alive.
The World War II hero Bucky Barnes had been killed in battle seventy years before. He was dead.
Dead long before Tony was even born, yet for some reason Fate or whatever asshole mystical forces controlled soulmarks decided that his was the name Tony should wear on his wrist.
Tony thought he’d accepted it, resigned himself to the fact that he’d never know his soulmate, but now, when his friend needed his support, it was all he could think about.
Sure, your soulmate was turned into a mindless assassin, but at least you knew her.
It took more effort than it should, but he managed not to say the bitter words out loud.
~~~
Every day, Bucky remembered a little more. Sometimes the memories were good (like sneaking into the pictures with Stevie when they were kids) and sometimes they were horrible (like slaughtering a child’s mother in front of him while he screamed).
Steve found him--in a ramshackle apartment in Romania--before Bucky was ready to face him, to face the world, but he didn’t leave. Steve stood by Bucky through the nightmares and the fits of rage. Steve held him close when the tears came, talked to him when all he could do was curl up in a ball and stare at nothing.
Steve talked to him about Tony. He smiled when he spoke of the man, but there was something he was holding back.
Bucky found himself looking at his blank metal wrist. “Anthony,” he whispered.
“You remember?” Steve asked cautiously.
“We had the same name.”
“Yeah, we did. But, Buck,” Steve hesitated, looking guilty, “He doesn’t have yours. I’m his soulmate, but...”
“But I’m not,” Bucky finished. He felt his cheek move in a quick imitation of a smile. “That’s okay, Stevie. I’m not fit to be anyone’s soulmate now, anyway.” Steve opened his mouth, probably to argue, but Bucky continued before he could, “I’m glad you’ve found your soulmate. But why the hell are you here instead of with him?”
Steve was quiet for a moment. “Because you need me. I love Tony, but you’ve always been the most important person in my life, Buck.”
That wasn’t how things were supposed to be. “I don’t need you. Go back to your soulmate, Steve.”
“Come with me, and I will.”
Bucky stared at Steve’s familiarly stubborn face, and sighed. “Fine.”
Steve’s face lit up with hope.
Then Bucky looked at his metal wrist again, and another memory came. “But... I think I killed his parents.”
~~~
Steve had a hard time believing it.
Tony had welcomed him back to his home and his bed, despite Steve’s leaving for so long to find and take care of Bucky. Tony had invited Bucky to live in the Tower with the team, despite learning that the man had, while brainwashed, killed his parents.
It was almost everything Steve had dreamed of, back before the war. He, Bucky, and the wealthy (so much wealthier than they’d ever imagined) Anthony were living together, not in their imagined mansion, but in an enormous tower full of everything they could possibly need and more. Steve cuddled with his soulmate on a plush sofa, watching movies with Bucky and the rest of the Avengers, then retired to their bedroom. (And making love with his soulmate was incredible.)
But it wasn’t everything. Tony and Bucky had an uneasy truce; Steve had a feeling he was the only reason they even tried to get along. Whenever they were in a room together, Tony was either distant and polite or prickly and irritable, while Bucky drew in on himself more than he already was. Tony tried to hide that he was jealous of time Steve spent with Bucky, but Bucky picked up on it and started pulling back from Steve. Steve was afraid he was going to lose one of them.
Then he knew he was going to lose one of them.
“Find another way!” Steve yelled desperately into his comm, slamming another one of the huge robotic dog things into the warehouse wall and fighting to get to the room with the transdimensional portal that was the source of their foes.
“There is no other way, Steve.” Iron Man’s voice was serious, far more calm than the situation warranted. “It was opened from the other side; it has to be closed from the other side. I’ll... I’ll find a way back, I promise.”
“Let me do it,” another voice came over the line.
“Buck...” Steve’s heart was pounding, not from exertion, but from terror over the thought of losing either his soulmate or his best friend.
“Stevie. You need your soulmate. You don’t need me. Besides, I... I’ve got a feeling this is what I’m supposed to do.”
“Please, I can’t lose you, I can’t lose either of you,” Steve begged, fighting harder to get to the portal.
“I’m sorry. Goodbye, Stevie.”
The comm clicked silent.
“NO! BUCKY!”
Steve made it through the doorway just in time to see the portal wink out of existence.
~~~
When the captured villain of the week gloated about unleashing dozens of his canine creations through a portal to another universe, Tony thought it was bullshit. But in case it wasn’t, he headed to the location of the alleged portal, promising to call for backup if he needed it.
Two miles out from the abandoned warehouse, his sensors picked up readings similar to those he’d gotten from the Chitauri portal.
“Fan-fucking-tastic,” he grumbled. He was about to report in, when the readings vanished. “What the--? JOCASTA, confirm.”
“I am no longer detecting tetryon radiation. If there was a portal, it appears to have been closed.”
“Life signs in the building?”
“I am detecting one humanoid presence, as well as mechanical activity that may indicate the presence of the claimed robotic canines.”
By the time Tony reached the warehouse, JOCASTA reported that the mechanical activity had ceased.
Tony landed in front of the main warehouse entrance, aiming his repulsors at the door as it suddenly swung open.
The man that emerged was panting, his dark shoulder-length hair falling out of a bun and into his face. Stubble covered the lower half of his face, and his grey-blue eyes looked somehow familiar--as did his metal left arm, which apart from fitting his more masculine build seemed almost identical to Peggy’s, down to the red star at the top.
Another Winter Soldier?
When the man noticed Iron Man, he didn’t go for the rifle slung over his shoulder. Instead, a smile spread across his face--which made him look even more familiar, did Tony know this guy?
“No sudden moves, Robocop. You wanna tell me what you were up to in there?”
The man shrugged. “Fighting robo-dogs. Are you Anthony Stark?”
How did he...? Only the Avengers knew who Iron Man was. “Who’s asking?”
The man seemed to consider his answer for a moment. “James Buchanan Barnes.”
“Bullshit,” Tony said.
But then JOCASTA displayed a familiar image on the HUD. “Facial recognition gives a 98% match for Sergeant James Buchanan Barnes.”
“Holy shit,” Tony said.
~~~
“Are you sure about this?”
Bucky wrapped his arms around Tony’s waist and tucked his chin over Tony’s shoulder. He could feel the tension in the other man’s back. “I’m sure, Tony.”
“This could be your only chance to go home.”
Bucky intertwined the fingers of his left hand with Tony’s, shifting their forearms so he and Tony could see the marks on both wrists.
The mark on Bucky’s wrist was engraved in the metal, but the signature matched the one he’d lost when he lost the arm:
Anthony Edward Stark.
And on Tony’s wrist, in Bucky’s hand:
James Buchanan Barnes.
Maybe it should have been awkward, becoming intimate with this man who both was and was not the man whose parents he’d killed. This man who was not the Tony Stark who loved his Steve, who put up with Bucky for his soulmate’s sake. This man who looked almost exactly like him, who shared his name and his abilities and many of his mannerisms, but was different in so many little ways, and one crucial way--he was Bucky’s soulmate.
“I am home,” Bucky said softly. “This is where I’m supposed to be. Here with you.”
Tony started trembling slightly, and pulled their joined hands back around his waist. Bucky took the hint and held him tightly, murmuring words of reassurance and love until Tony finally relaxed, took a deep breath, and pulled away. “Okay, then. Let’s send a message.”
~~~
“Sir, I am detecting tetryon emissions within the tower,” JARVIS reported.
Steve dropped his sketchpad and got to his feet. “Does that mean--?”
“Another portal,” Tony answered grimly, shoving aside the holographic blueprints on which he’d been focused. “Suit me up, J, and can you pull up video?”
Steve was headed for the door to suit up himself when JARVIS responded, “The emissions have ceased.”
“What?” Tony asked, exchanging a confused look with Steve.
“Did anything come through?” Steve asked JARVIS.
“The portal was less than two millimeters in diameter, and I have detected no evidence of anything physical having emerged. However, I have received a video transmission addressed to Captain Rogers.”
“Play it,” Steve ordered.
His breath caught when Bucky’s smiling face appeared projected in the air over a lab table. “Hey, Stevie.”
A warm hand landed on Steve’s shoulder--Tony offering support. Steve was grateful, but couldn’t speak, couldn’t look away from the video.
In the recording, Bucky was wearing an AC/DC shirt that stretched tight over his muscles. His hair was pulled back neatly, his face clean-shaven. He showed no signs of injury or distress. “I’m sending this video to tell you to stop worrying about me. I’m okay. I’m--better than okay, actually, I’m... happy.
“Like your Tony guessed, that portal led to another dimension, a parallel universe. It was wacky getting used to the differences here, but a lot’s the same. There are Avengers here, more of ‘em--you should see if you can find a Carol Danvers in your universe, she’s amazing. There’s a Steve here, but... he’s not you. For one, he roots for the Yankees, the heathen.”
Steve smiled at the look of disgust on Bucky’s face, agreeing with the sentiment.
Then Bucky’s face grew serious. “His soulmate is Peggy Carter.” Steve felt Tony’s hand tighten briefly at that revelation. “She was the Winter Soldier here. Now she’s an Avenger. So am I.
“I’m staying here, Stevie. If you’re working on some sort of rescue, don’t, ‘cause I’m staying right here. This where I’m supposed to be, where I was always supposed to be. I...” Bucky swallowed, shifting his gaze to somewhere beyond the view of the recording.
Steve’s eyes widened as someone joined Bucky onscreen. Someone that looked almost identical to the man beside Steve. Onscreen Tony brought a hand up to rest reassuringly on Bucky’s shoulder, unknowingly mirroring the watching Tony and Steve. The look of love in Onscreen Tony’s eyes was unmistakable. Seeing that look directed at Bucky instead of himself was surreal, but it made him feel unexpectedly warm.
“I’ve found my soulmate.” The look of happiness on Bucky’s face was one Steve hadn’t seen since the war--maybe before.
“I’ll miss you, Stevie, and I know you’ll miss me. But we’re both where we belong.
“Take care of yourself. And your Tony. I love you.”
The recording ended.
~~~