A/N: Hello, and welcome! This is book 4 of my Bucky Barnes/OC series, so for those of you who are new to this I highly recommend you try the other parts first. For those of you returning, welcome back, and thank you. :)

Without further ado, I shall start.

1 - Mission Report

My hand was shaking slightly as I pushed open the door, ignoring the smeared hand print I left on the glass. I was drenched in my own blood, the deep red colour staining the pale green of my blouse and my blue jeans.

The man behind the counter stared at me with wide eyes.

"Help me," I pleaded, placing a blood-covered hand on the wooden desk in order to offer my weakened body more support. "Please."

The man nodded his head vigorously and picked up the phone, dialling those all-important three numbers. His eyes kept darting to me with equal measures of fear and concern while he waited for someone to pick up at the other end. "Hello?" he said, his voice trembling. "Um, yeah, I need an ambulance. And fast."

Bucky hadn't expected to find himself outside the Avengers Tower quite so soon, and yet here he was, standing on the sidewalk, staring up at the obnoxious structure like it was the very thing that would end his life.

Shaking his head at the frustrating inevitability of the whole situation, Bucky entered the building, ignoring the front desk entirely and heading straight for the elevator at the back. The woman at the desk clearly recognised him, for she didn't try to hinder him in any way.

"Wherever Stark is," he muttered to the air.

He was expecting the usual response of, "Of course, Sergeant Barnes," from Jarvis, so when it didn't come he knew something was seriously wrong. He pressed the button for the penthouse suite, and the doors slid closed.

Bucky rubbed his eyes, feeling his tiredness linger over him. The stress of the last few weeks had meant many sleepless nights and many mentally exhausting days.

The elevator pinged slightly when the doors opened, and Bucky stepped into Stark's penthouse suite. It was... well, it was chaos. Glass littered the floor, many pieces of furniture were broken, and there were various bullet holes in the walls.

The Avengers were gathered around the only whole table left, looking through old paper files for something.

Bucky mentally steeled himself, before asking, "So what went wrong this time?"

All heads snapped his way in a second. Steve was most surprised. "Bucky? What are you doing here?"

Bucky walked further into the room. "Daph and I sensed trouble when we saw the report about you finding the sceptre," he explained vaguely. "I came to offer a hand."

"And where is the wife?" Stark asked with a lazy half-grin.

Bucky rolled his eyes. "Daphne has other things to worry about. She's gone to see a friend." He folded his arms over his chest. "What happened?"

"Genius over here created a killer robot," Natasha said, pointing her thumb at Stark.

Bucky raised an eyebrow, then sighed. "You experimented with the sceptre, didn't you?"

Stark shrugged. "Wouldn't you?"

"No. I would have sent it to Asgard, where it can't be misused," Bucky replied blandly. He sighed, rubbing his hands over his face. His exhaustion was becoming ever more apparent in the weight of his limbs. "So, apart from the fact it wants to kill everyone, what's so special about this robot of yours? Because surely if it were like the rest you'd have simply shut it down by now."

"He can... well, he can think," Stark explained with a frown. "He also has limitless access to anything connected to the internet. We planned to make it so his protocols were based on preserving peace but he's gone rogue."

"Of course he has," Bucky muttered. "I'm guessing his body is one of your supposedly all-powerful suits?"

"Actually to our knowledge he's yet to reclaim another body, since his last one was destroyed." He waved a hand over towards Bucky's right, and he turned to see a smashed door and a pile of scrap metal. It fit well with all the broken glass, splintered wood and ripped fabric lying about.

"And I suppose you're now trying to work out where he'll go next."

"Right now we're looking for information relating to someone called Wolfgang von Strucker."

Bucky frowned. "The Sokovian guy?"

They all stared at him as if he'd grown another head. "You know him?"

"He was there when Daphne and I got captured by Hydra last year," he explained. "Him, along with a g-"

"Wait, I know that guy," Tony suddenly cut in, taking a file out of Thor's hands. "From back in the day." Tony frowned, glancing over the sheet in front of him. "He operates off the African coast, black market arms." He glanced up to see Steve giving him an accusing look. "There are conventions, alright? You meet people; I didn't sell him anything. He was talking about finding something new - a game changer. It was all very 'Ahab'."

"This," Thor said suddenly, pointing at the image.

Tony raised an eyebrow. "Uh, it's a tattoo. I don't think he had it-"

"No, those are tattoos, this is a brand."

Bruce Banner moved over to a computer, and he quickly put up an image of the same pattern on his screen. "Oh, yeah. It's a word in an African dialect meaning 'thief', only in a much less friendly way."

"What dialect?" Steve asked.

"Wakanada...? Wa...Wa...Wakanda."

Tony and Steve instantly turned to one another. "If this guy got out of Wakanda with some of their trade goods..." Tony frowned.

"I thought your father said he got the last of it."

Bruce interrupted their little private conversation, giving voice to the question they all wanted answered. "I don't follow. What comes out of Wakanda?"

Tony glanced to his right, and Bucky followed his gaze to see he was staring at Steve's shield. "The strongest metal on Earth," he answered.

Steve looked at Tony. "Where is this guy now?"

Tony sighed. "I don't know."

"Can I see that?" Bucky asked, holding a hand out for the file still in Tony's hand. Tony blinked, then handed it over without a word. Bucky swore under his breath in Russian as soon as he saw the image. "I've met him before," he said sharply. "He was one of Hydra's favourite contacts. He was a powerful ally, and he likely has more missiles and weapons of mass destruction than your average highly developed country." He faced Stark, eyes and face serious. "Despite whatever interactions you may have had in the past, he's not on your side. He's not on anybody's side. If I'm remembering rightly, the only thing he cares about is profit."

"Noted," he said off-handedly. "But do you know where he is?"

Bucky shrugged. "Last time I heard his name, he was stationed off the coast of South Africa," he said, swiftly nudging Dr Banner aside and bringing up a map of said country. He then pointed to the south-east coast. "Right about there. There's a place called... I don't know... Saldanha, or something. He used to be posted a few miles south of that, but whether he still is... I've no idea."

"It's better than anything the rest of us have got," Steve said, giving Bucky a quick, grateful nod, which he returned.

Bucky blinked in surprise when his phone suddenly started going off in his pocket. He frowned when he read the name on the screen. "Excuse me for a minute," he mumbled, before accepting the call and putting the phone against his ear. "Hello?"

"Hi, Bucky. Sorry about the call. You weren't in the middle of something, were you?"

"No, it's fine," he said hurriedly, frowning. "Is everything alright?"

"Uh, well, Daphne called me yesterday morning. She had to make an emergency stop." Bucky's heart froze in his chest, and instantly his mind began racing with all the different situations that could have caused her to stray from her plan. "Before you start panicking, she said it was nothing important, and to be honest, she sounded absolutely fine."

"Are you sure?"

"Yeah, pretty sure. It's probably nothing to worry about, but she asked that I pass it on."

"Why didn't she just phone me?" Bucky asked, frowning in confusion. It was rare, but every now and then Daphne still did things he didn't understand. This was one of them.

There was a sigh from the other end of the line. "I don't know, Bucky, and I'm sorry about that. I'm just passing on her message."

"Alright, well, thanks."

"No problem. Look after the guys, okay?"

Bucky chuckled. "Yes, ma'am." And then he hung up. He wasn't known for saying goodbye at the end of his phone calls. He returned to the main room, ignoring the fact that everyone was staring curiously at him. "We leaving or what?" he asked impatiently.

Steve was the first to snap out of it. He nodded. "Everyone go and get suited up," he ordered. "You've got five minutes, then we have to go."

"Is this it?" Steve asked, turning to face Bucky, who had changed out of his casual clothes and into the leather outfit that Stark had made for him not long after Daphne came back from the dead. He glanced at the Captain and nodded. His memory of Klaue's place was patchy, but he was sure this shipment yard and the one he had in his head were one and the same. Steve turned to the others. "Alright, so here's the plan. Banner, you stay here and keep an eye on the jet. With any luck you won't be needed but be prepared for a Code Green."

"Got it."

"Clint, Natasha, you two are in charge of taking down as many reinforcements as possible, whether they're Iron Legion or some of Klaue's men." The two assassins nodded. "The rest of us will be taking on Ultron."

Bucky glanced at the ship's main control panel, then frowned. "Hold on," he murmured, drawing eyes his way as he examined one of the screens, which showed heat signatures in the building. He struggled for a second, still not used to modern technology, then managed to zoom in on a particular section of the base. There were two heat patches that stayed very close to Ultron's cold, metal body at all times. "It looks like Ultron's got himself some allies. Human, both of them, though I suspect they're something special, else he probably wouldn't put up with them."

"The Maximoff twins," Steve said to no one in particular.

Bucky stiffened immediately. "They're here?"

"You know them?"

Bucky nodded. "They were under Hydra's command," he said simply. He frowned. "How do you know them?"

"When we were attacking Strucker's base they were there," Steve said. He sighed. "This isn't going to be easy, so watch your backs, and be careful."

Stark, now dressed in his Iron Man suit, laughed. "Careful is not a word that appears in my dictionary," he said, before pulling open the main door and flying out. Thor swung his hammer and few times and then was quick to follow.

Natasha sighed in exasperation, as if this sort of behaviour was common for those two. "I guess we're left to go on foot. You guys go ahead - Barton and I will find another way in."

"Got it."

Bucky ran alongside Steve as they followed the path Thor and Iron Man had taken, and once they were inside they found the Thunder God waiting for them, but no sign of Stark. Thor gestured for them to follow him, and they crept quietly through the compound until they came to an open area full of missiles. Bucky felt his hand twitching towards the LMG he'd strapped to his back almost as soon as his eyes fell upon the room.

Across a small bridge was a group of people and one large metal robot, who Bucky could only assume was the infamous Ultron (a.k.a. Murderbot, as Dr Banner had so accurately labelled him).

"Don't compare me with Stark!" Bucky's whole body twitched with the desire to launch into a fight when Ulysses Klaue was kicked roughly down a set of stairs by the large metal man. "It's a thing with me. Stark is... he's a sickness!"

"Aw, Junior," Stark said, floating down from a very convenient hole in the ceiling above Bucky's head. The billionaire landed in front of Bucky, Steve and Thor. "You're gonna break your old man's heart."

Ultron turned and grinned, which in and of itself was incredibly unnerving, because robots weren't supposed to be capable of doing such a thing. Bucky couldn't help but hate modern day technology even more. "If I have to," he said.

"We don't have to break anything," Thor said coldly.

"Clearly you've never made an omelette," Ultron mused.

Stark turned to face the others. "He beat me by one second."

"Ah, this is funny, Mr Stark," Pietro Maximoff said, and to Bucky's trained ears he noticed that the English language wasn't one Pietro Maximoff spoke anywhere near as fluently as his sister. "It's what... Comfortable? Like old times?"

"This was never my life," Stark retorted.

"You two can still walk away from this," Steve said, stepping forward slightly.

Wanda Maximoff smirked. "Oh, we will."

"I know you've suffered-"

"Ugh!" Steve was cut off by a very loud sound of disgust from their resident robot. "Captain America. God's righteous man, pretending you could live without a war. I can't physically throw up in my mouth, but..."

"If you believe in peace then let us keep it," Thor said, getting the conversation back on track.

"I think you're mistaking peace with quiet," Ultron commented idly.

"Yuh-huh," Stark interjected, sounding impatient. "What's the vibranium for?"

"I'm glad you asked that, because I wanted to take this time to explain my evil plan." Ultron's hand suddenly shot out, forming a strange magnetic force that had the Iron Man suit lurching forward (and Bucky's arm shuddering slightly), before a beam of energy shot from his hand and pounded Stark into a wall. Iron Man was up instantly, racing towards Ultron.

Bucky was immediately distracted by the so-called Iron Legion, who suddenly launched themselves at him, Thor and Steve. He ducked an idle swung before grabbing hold of the robot by the throat with his flesh hand and then reeling back his metal hand all the way. The metal creature's head snapped cleanly off when his fist collided with its head. His breath was then knocked out of him when an invisible force barrelled into him, knocking him down. When he rolled to a stop, he glanced up just in time to see Pietro Maximoff smirking at him before he disappeared in a stream of blue.

"Asshole," Bucky muttered to himself in Russian, before rolling out of the way just in time to avoid getting shot by one of Stark's rogue metal men. He grabbed the robot's leg and flung him in Thor's direction as he climbed to his feet. Thor's hammer came smashing down on the robot, leaving it to crumple on the floor in a pile of scrap metal.

The God drew his arm back and threw his hammer into an approaching robot, and Bucky couldn't help but laugh to himself when he heard that accented voice yelp. It seemed Speedy had gotten cocky. He turned around to see Steve by the boy.

"Stay down, kid," the Captain said, before walking off.

Bucky rolled his eyes. "Like a few scolding words is gonna work," he muttered. He moved to go and help Thor, who was chasing after another robot around a corner, when suddenly there was a flash of red in his vision. His body collapsed onto the ground before he could comprehend what had happened, and he was unable to get back up as his mind fell completely blank.