Big thanks to my betas, equalopportunityobsessor and MelancholyMadness, for helping me with this chapter.

This fic will probably be pretty long and I don't work with a schedule so you might want to subscribe if you plan to read it...

This is a work in progress: I will add relevant warnings at the beginning of each chapter. Please proceed cautiously if you are likely to be triggered by physical or psychological torture. Tell me if you think that there are triggers I didn't tag yet.

I put it in the "Avengers" section, but the Winter Soldier is not listed as a character, and it starts during the first Iron Man movie, so it's not really accurate... Big spoiler ahead for the Iron Man and Captain America movies (especially CA:TWS).

English is not my first language, I'm not an expert on the movies and I can make mistakes: please tell me if you see anything weird!


The hot Afghan air filled his mouth with blood and dust. He felt like he was choking. Yinsen was dead. Tony should have realized what the doctor had meant when he said he would be "seeing his family". So much for being a genius.

Idiot. He felt so useless. What kind of man was he if he couldn't even save the one man that needed him? His only consolation was the thought of revenge... and then, escape.

Don't waste your life.

With one last look for Yinsen, Tony rose from the stone floor of the cave. He had a life to live, mistakes to fix. Scaring away the terrorists was easy; his priority was to destroy every last Stark weapon from the camp. He was soon pretty sure that he had succeeded (the whole place had been blown up), and as the shooting resumed around him, he took off into the sky.

But the moments of freedom were just that: moments. Before he knew it, he'd crashed into the sand in his half-reduced-to-pieces armor.

"Not bad," he said to himself, impressed, before picking himself up to begin his trek under the desert sun.

He didn't make it far. He was hurt, dehydrated, and hadn't eaten properly in a few months. His muscles ached more and more with every step and another layer of sand crusted to his face with every bead of sweat. Luckily, after what could only have been a few hours – it had felt like weeks, but the sun was still high in the sky – the sound of helicopter blades turning sounded from above. A black helicopter was headed straight for him. Relief swept his body. He took one feeble step, staggered, and fell to his knees.

Before the helicopter could land, a dark-haired man jumped out, onto the sand in front of him. With military-like posture, he stalked towards Tony.

Wait. Is his arm metal? Who is this guy?

Contrary to what was widely believed, Tony still had a shred of survival instinct left in his body, and at the moment, it screamed to him to get the hell away from that man. He'd never seen him before, couldn't justify why the hair on his arms were standing on end, but there was almost something... animalistic about him. He didn't walk. He prowled, as if he was a tiger and Tony the defenseless prey. Which was, sadly, probably the truth, if the people in this helicopter were not the help he had been waiting for.

He desperately tried to scramble back, possibly stand up, but to no avail. A metallic hand closed on the front of his shirt, yanking him off his feet and forward. Up close, the guy was more than terrifying. Not only because of the obvious reasons, like his extremely evident muscular build that made him look as if he could snap Tony in two, or the guns sticking visibly out of his belt (okay, maybe that was part of it…). No, the reason that he'd rather take on an angry bear than stay with the man in front of him for another five seconds was that his eyes were dead. Dark hollow caverns that held no sympathy, no concentration, just a cold detached disinterest that chilled him straight to the arc reactor. Tony gulped and tried to struggle, but his attempts were futile. The muzzle of a gun pressed into his left temple and Tony sighed in defeat.

His hands held high in surrender, he allowed himself to be dragged back to the helicopter, and, his vision already swimming, felt a prick in his neck, before the darkness swallowed him whole.


When Tony came to, he was lying down on what he guessed, from the sound of the engine, was the floor of a van, probably a Russian one. His hands were tightly handcuffed behind his back. He groaned and tried to raise his head, but the strain was too much, so he set it back down, exhausted. He had no idea what those bastards had given to him, but he still felt like all his thoughts had to dig their way through dense fog. Even his tongue seemed leaden.

He felt the vicious kick to his ribcage before he registered it. The grunt he made seemed out of time. Tony wondered if he had, in fact, grunted on time and just hadn't realized it, or if he was just grunting because it was the thing to do when you got kicked in the ribs. Probably the first. And why would that even matter?

"He's waking up," a man called from somewhere above him, maybe the one who had kicked him? "Isn't it a little early? We won't be there for another half an hour..."

Another voice answered. "He will wait." While the first one had seemed annoyed (and perhaps slightly worried), that one was deep, cold and emotionless. Wonder who that is, Tony thought sarcastically. Great.

When they stopped – probably thirty minutes later – the drugs still weren't out of his system and dehydration left his head drooping. He was too weak to fight when the strong human hand of the metal-armed man caught him by the arm and hoisted him upward. His feet scraped along the ground as he was dragged out of the vehicle. He tried to regain his footing, but had little success.

The air wasn't as dry as it had been before: they had probably left the desert. After a few moments, the blinding light and stifling heat were brutally replaced by darkness and cold, that soon, as he grew accustomed to them, became artificial light and nicely cool air. A building, then. A short walk later, he was shoved forward, but the hand gripping him from behind stopped him from falling on his face.

'Welcome, Mr. Stark,' a cold German-accented voice greeted.

The man holding him suddenly pushed him forward, but before he had enough time to straighten up, the German man gripped his throat and lifted him up until he was just barely on his toes. He tried to speak, but only gurgling sounds came out, half from the pressure on his throat and half from his swollen tongue. He blinked hazily.

The man in front of him was tall, taller than he was, and his face was completely bland apart from the smile that stretched his lips without reaching his eyes. The man scrutinized him for one more second, squeezed the soft spot below his jaw, and let him drop to his knees.

"He appears to be in perfect condition," the man said.

Yeah right, Tony thought.

"Perfect. Put him to work as soon as possible. He will be a valuable acquisition to HYDRA."

Oh hell no, Tony thought. HYDRA sounded suspiciously like the Nazi organization that Captain America fought against during the Second World War (that is, if the stories his father had told him were true). Tony may have been naive enough to be business partners with terrorists, but he was not stupid enough to help Nazis.

"Yes, sir!" the voice of the man that had kicked him in the van answered from behind him.

In one last ditch effort to escape, he tried to jerk out of his captor's grip, but he was easily ripped back towards the man and received a punch to the gut for his efforts. He swore silently, tears prickling his eyes from the pain. Without a word, he was manhandled through another door, lucky enough, this time, to right himself on both feet, but still unable to stop moving. They only walked for a few minutes before he was unbound and thrown on a concrete floor. He barely managed to roll to avoid hitting his head on the ground as the door closed behind him, locking him inside.

"Well, fuck," he breathed.


He was tired, and hungry, and so fucking cold. The small, unappetizing "meal" he had eaten a few hours ago hadn't helped: he knew that he was kept in this state on purpose. Now that he wasn't drugged anymore, he could move freely, but he felt terribly weak. He didn't know for how long he had been there, but if he was receiving two meals a day as he thought, it had been around two weeks. And they had not asked him for a single thing.

He knew what it was, of course. It was a form of torture, one far more refined and effective than anything the Ten Rings could come up with. He wanted to say that he would not break, but it was hard. The time in this small, cold room, completely bare, had left him weaker than he had ever been. After the cave, it was too much. He was ready to give up his pride just for a warm shower, some real food and a night in a bed. And he had precisely zero idea about how he could escape.

Suddenly, jerking him out of his doze, what sounded suspiciously like a distant explosion rattled the room. He jumped to his feet – well, he tried, it was actually more like scrambling – and cautiously approached the door. It was still locked and made of steel, and he had checked it a dozen times in the beginning, so he didn't need to try again to know that he couldn't open it, but he really hoped that whoever was coming wouldn't leave him there.

Indeed, after a wait during which he heard muffled shouting and running on the other side of the door, it opened to reveal a few people dressed in black and carrying guns.

"Who...?" he managed to get out from his parched and sore throat. He hadn't drunk enough in the last few weeks, and hadn't had anyone to speak to: he was a little rusty...

"Strategic Homeland Intervention, Enforcement and Logistic Division, sir," a young man who didn't even look to be twenty-five answered. "Who are you?"

He wondered how it was possible for him not to be recognized, before remembering that he had disappeared for probably more than three months, was likely supposed dead, had lost weight, hadn't shaved for two weeks and was very, very dirty. The boy had no reason to expect Tony Stark, billionaire playboy, to be this filthy bearded stranger in a HYDRA base.

Before he could open his mouth to answer, however, a gun went off and the man suddenly fell to the ground. Pushed behind the fighting men, Tony could only watch as each one was hit by a single bullet between the eyes.

The sniper appeared at the corner of the hallway. It was the man with the metal arm.

Without thinking, he bolted toward the opposite direction, hoping that there was an exit that way. No, who was he kidding? He wasn't even thinking that far... Hoping to get as far as possible from the room he had been trapped in and the man he had been trapped by. Intellectually, he knew that it was useless, that in the state he was in, he wasn't going to go very far, but it was instinct. Don't stay here.

He ran a few meters before the man caught up with him and slammed him into the wall by his throat. Black spot started dancing at the corners of his eyes and he went limp, recognizing a lost battle: he wasn't getting out today. The adrenaline was receding, leaving only weakness and exhaustion in its wake.

However, the man didn't seem interested in the cell anymore. Holding him by the upper arm, he started dragging Tony through the hallway. It was mostly deserted, and anyone still alive ended up shot in the forehead – HYDRA, or whatever organization the men from before had been, the man didn't make any distinction. They soon reached a door that led them outside, where a helicopter sat, apparently waiting for them.

Not again, he thought tiredly when he felt a needle sting his arm. While he was slowly blacking out on the floor of the aircraft, his eyes fell on a small cluster of agents that were watching them from the ground, led by a scowling woman looking at him with a gun in her hands and a glare on her face. She was shooting at the vehicle, but he didn't stay conscious long enough to know whether it had any effect.


This time, he woke up shackled to a chair. Well, that brought back some very unfortunate memories... At least this time, he had no bag on his head, and he could feel the reassuring hum of the arc-reactor in his chest.

A bald, old-looking man was sitting in front of him in an armchair, fingertips touching in front of his lips. Seriously, could this become any more cliche? The only thing missing was a big white cat.

...Well, apparently the snark was still the first part of him to wake up...

Tony still felt groggy, but not half as bad as the time after his escape from the cave. He felt coherent enough to be sure of one thing: he had to pretend to cooperate, couldn't afford to refuse because he couldn't take another fucking day of torture: it would break him. Whatever that man was going to ask, he would have to play along. Even if it was about building weapons. Hell, if it meant that they were willing to let him access explosive, it wouldn't even be a bad thing...

"Are you ready to work for us, Mr. Stark?" the man asked on, his voice saccharine.

The genius hung his head, trying to look even more defeated than he felt.

"Very well. You are going to repair a... device, think of it as a test... If you really cooperate, I will see about giving you a more important task. The Winter Soldier will be your guard; I wouldn't recommend doing anything stupid, as he has been known to be somewhat extreme in his reaction to stupidity. But for now... Asset, take him to the shower, he stinks."

The same metal-armed man from before – the Winter Soldier, probably – unshackled him and grabbed him by his upper arm. A lot more alert than the previous times he had been in this position, Tony managed to walk fast enough to keep what was left of his dignity, and followed to what looked like some changing room shower. Ugh. Nazis and showers, bad association. He stopped in his tracks.

"Undress here and clean up."

His voice was still completely emotionless, almost like a robot – except that Tony knew JARVIS, and JARVIS voice was nothing like that – but, he also noticed, hoarse from disuse. Apparently, he didn't talk much. Well, Tony was nothing if not ready to fill the silence...

"Is that a joke?", he started, pleasantly surprised by how steady his voice sounded after the first two syllables, despite the hoarseness created by dehydration and silence. "I'm supposed to just get naked here in front of your tender eyes and at least a dozen security cameras?" He swept an arm around to the various surveillance devices in the room.

The Soldier didn't answer, although his eyebrows had lifted a little. He didn't really need to call his bluff, since it was pretty obvious that the genius didn't have a choice. And despite what he had just said, Tony didn't care about being naked in front of anyone (and hadn't since the eighties), least of all him: he was well aware that his vulnerability had very little to do with his state of undress, and the man looked as interested as a rock. An extremely unimpressed rock. But Tony needed to talk to someone or something that wasn't himself, because he felt broken and aching after the days he had spent in isolation, and snark gave him at least the illusion that he wasn't completely helpless and reminded him that he was still human.

Sighing, he started undressing, letting his unhappiness known by a constant litany of complains. Playing the spoiled brat was easy, it had helped him mask his discomfort for years and he could probably do it in his sleep. He could do this, keep playing nice like he had done with the Ten Rings and get out at the first occasion.

To his surprise, the water wasn't exactly cold – which was fortunate, given his recent encounter with forced drowning – but it wasn't warm either, and he didn't stay longer than it was strictly necessary. Standing there wet, naked and shivering, he realized that his old clothes had disappeared.

"Hum, not to sound pushy, but am I really supposed to stay like that?" he asked, a little put out.

"Clothes later. Come," was the only answer he got before the man started walking.

Fortunately, Tony noticed the towel that had probably been left for him on the floor and grabbed it, tying it around his hips before following. He was led to a small room with a narrow bed that looked like it came from a Romanian orphanage and two chairs, one of which had simple gray clothes – a shirt, boxers and flimsy trousers – on the back. The soldier sat on the other one, still as emotionless as before.

The engineer only put the boxers on before slipping under the cover and falling asleep.


He woke up feeling more rested than he had since his escape from the Ten Rings, or probably even longer, even if he was still far from his best.

Which was nice, but not enough to make up for the fact that he was being shaken awake by a goddamn psychopathic-looking HYDRA henchman.

And the metal fingers were not exactly pleasant where they dug in his shoulder.

He opened his eyes and sat up, hoping for the manhandling to stop. It did, and soon a tray was shoved under his nose. He accepted it and started eating the frugal breakfast that was on it. The food didn't taste very good, but he was hungry and so didn't complain.

"So, what am I supposed to do, today?" he asked his guard as cheerily as he could fake it. "Got troubles with your Starkphone?"

Predictably enough, the man stayed silent. He was still looking at him unwaveringly, and Tony found himself staring to be sure that he blinked. He did, but the blank face was still unnerving.

He didn't try to get a rise from him again, and as soon as he had finished his meal and put on the clothes they had given him, the soldier grabbed him by his arm and marched him through the door, a hallway that was closed by checkpoint on regular intervals – which shouldn't disappoint him since it was highly unlikely that his guard would let him go anywhere he wasn't ordered to – and to a room where the old man from the previous day was waiting for them.

"Good morning, Mr. Stark, I hope you slept well?" he greeted him with a voice that reminded him of some of the most vicious businessmen he had come across in his life, saccharine and threatening at the same time.

"Yeah, well, the awakening could have been better," he answered with a bright, fake smile. "Not sure I can give you more than two stars."

He looked around him, keeping his smile on. The room was small and almost bare, but its main feature was obviously the big black chair standing in the middle. It looked a lot like a dentist chair, but with restrains on the arms and a strange circular device above the head. Was it supposed to go around it? Tony had a very, very bad feeling about this...

But the part of him that wasn't busy being terrified by the whole situation or disgusted by what looked an awful lot like a torture device, the one that had eyes for machines and weapons, efficiency and numbers, noticed that there were wires sticking out of the thing, that it probably didn't work, and that he was probably supposed to fix it.

As he reached this conclusion, his host answered.

"Rest assured that we do everything we can to accommodate you. Now, I assume you know why you are here. We want you to repair this. You will start working today; you will be provided with the original blueprints and all the tools you will need. I trust that it will only take you a few days."

The alternative was not enunciated but clearly implied, and Tony didn't say anything, starkly aware that he did not have the upper hand and that opening his mouth would only bring troubles. After a pause, the man smiled thinly.

"Very well, I shall let you get started, then. Asset, guard him."

He left without another word, the door clicking shut behind him, and Tony swallowed. The soldier did not move from the corner he had posted himself in, impassive.

He turned to the chair: no sense waiting for tools to try and get an outline of the problem. Apparently, it had been shot at...

That was when his brain caught up with his eyes. There was something wrong with the restrains. Why were there padded on one side and not on the other? And there was something that looked a lot like an electromagnet built in the steel one.

Dread building in his stomach, he turned back to the metal-armed man who was guarding him.

Well, then, he probably had his answer, didn't he?