"Bucky." The Soldier's head jerked up slightly before he caught himself. He cast a sideways gaze to make sure that it had in fact been the Captain's voice and not some random tourists talking about the exhibit in front of him.

It was. He met the taller man's concerned blue eyes only momentarily before dropping his gaze like a repentant child. "That's... That's really me, isn't it?" He asked softly, inclining his head almost imperceptibly toward the display case where the glass reflected his tired and stubbled face, framed by a curtain of greasy shoulder-length hair, next to that of a handsome young soldier who he felt like he'd seen before. He supposed he could remember seeing that face in the mirror, vaguely anyway, as if it had been a dream.

"Yeah, Buck, it is." The Captain's eyes searched his face. "Where have you been staying? Come home with me."

"I'm fine."

He didn't seem to have convinced the Captain any more than he'd convinced himself. "You look and smell like you've been sleeping rough. At least come have a shower and a solid meal and talk with me someplace more private than this."

The Soldier hesitated. He couldn't remember the last time he'd bathed, or had proper food. Not that food sounded appealing right now- he hadn't been doing the greatest job of keeping down what food he had stolen- but the idea of it sounded nice. The idea of sitting down, being safe, relaxing even slightly, if only for a few minutes, was tempting. He was so tired, weak, shaky. He had difficulty caring what ulterior motives the Captain might have, even as a vengeful voice in the back of his head screamed that he needed to get to work making Hydra PAY and what if the Captain got in the way of that?

"Please Bucky. Come home with me and talk, if only to give me closure." The Captain was almost pleading.

Something about it stirred a weird, long-forgotten, feeling of affection in him. "Fine." He mumbled.

"Shower and food, too?"

"Sure."

The hot water was heaven on almost all of him as he braced himself against the wall of the hotel shower and let it run over him. His chest burned dizzyingly under the spray. It had hurt before, but washing it really hurt. He hadn't actually seen his injuries since putting on his stolen clothes, days ago. The whole side of his chest was swollen and an angry red that contrasted starkly with the rainbow of bruises covering his right shoulder and the rest of his torso, crusted heavily around where flesh met metal. He gritted his teeth against the pain and let the water run over it anyway, rinsing away the top layer of sweat and blood and dirt. The pain was getting worse with time, too. Probably. Moving either arm hurt like hell, but the shoulder that the Captain had dislocated trying to make him let go of the chip was improving, or he thought so anyway, so it was a moving point of comparison. Whatever. Between his shoulder and his chest and the ribs he'd probably broken having a metal beam fall on him, moving fucking hurt.

But no matter. What was a little physical pain compared to everything else going on in his life?

His legs starting to tremble from being on his feet drew him out, to find that the clothes he'd taken off had been stealthily replaced by a clean tracksuit. That little kindness was more than he deserved. At least the sweatshirt had a pocket to hide his metal hand out of sight in.

"Hey! That feel better now? Have some food. I'm sorry I don't have anything homemade..."

The Soldier eyed the table loaded with something resembling every imaginable kind of takeout available in DC, before reaching (very) gingerly for some variety of white meat. He should attempt to get something into himself, and that looked like it might be easy on his stomach. "This is more than enough. Thank you."

"Of course! You're my best friend, Bucky, even if you don't remember growing up together right now. With you to the end of the line, you told me once, and I'm going to take care of you." The Captain told him earnestly.

The Soldier stared awkwardly at his plate, fiddling with a plastic fork. "I'm sorry."

"What for? You're not a burden. That's what friends are for."

"For not remembering our friendship. For hurting you. For everything I did under their control that's been wiped from my mind." He wanted to flee. Should flee. Didn't deserve this. But he was too tired to fight it. He could barely stay upright just now. That probably wasn't good, but he didn't have the energy think about the implications of that.

The Captain leaned over and squeezed his shoulder. The one that hadn't been dislocated, and on the flesh part of it not the metal part. Which the Soldier appreciated. "None of that is your fault. They used you, played around with your mind. But you're safe now, and it seems like you're starting to get your memory back. And I'm going to help you. It'll all come back if we just jog your memory enough." He sat back. "Eat. You probably haven't had proper food since the tavern we stopped at a week before we lost you. Since you clearly want to feel bad about something, I'll tell you about some of the things you did to me before the war and see if it jogs your memory at all. Starting with physically dragging me onto the Cyclone at Coney Island."

That was vaguely familiar. He didn't remember, but he somehow knew that that was a roller coaster and could piece the rest together. Enough, anyway. The corner of his mouth twitched despite himself. "Gee, thanks."

Yay, I got this starting to go up before Civil War comes out! (I've been working on it for quite a while now though.) So yeah. Reunion. Healing. Ummmm...this story is going to require trigger warnings on some chapters because Bucky will be regaining his memory and of course he saw/experienced some really messed up stuff with Hydra. Balancing those with not being spoiler-y will be interesting. But I will do my best to both label those sections really thoroughly and strike that balance.

Chapters will be uneven lengths. I didn't write it in a chapter format, so I'm splitting chapters at natural break points. Call it an experiment.

Also many of the things that happen are based on things I found on Pinterest, but this site is a pain about posting links, so I'll have to come up with something to give credit where it's due.