This is a sequel to my story Progress from 2012. You'll have to scroll a bit if you want to read it first, but you can just jump in here as well.
Warnings: The story deals with depression from an outsider's point of view. A man committing suicide under Steve's command is mentioned, and Steve's feelings following that. If this is likely to trigger you, please don't read this story.
Tony Stark could shoot a gun and hit the target, too. Steve hadn't been overly surprised. The man was the son of a weapons manufacturer, had owned the company himself and designed weapons, and knew how to aim a repulsor beam. Of course he'd know how to shoot a gun.
There was a gun range in one of the basements. It was 4 AM in the morning on a Tuesday when Steve found Stark at the range firing a gun with precise movements and the confidence of someone who had done this many times before. There was a pause between each shot, making the entire process seem almost meditative. Once the gun was empty, Stark reloaded it. He raised the weapon at the target again, held it there for a moment–
–and then emptied the entire clip as quickly as possible. There was nothing meditative about that, but he still mostly hit bull's eye.
"What are you doing here, Captain?" Tony demanded once he had finished and taken out his ear plugs.
"Couldn't sleep," Steve replied. He shouldn't have been surprised that Stark had seen him, even with his back turned. Perhaps he had Jarvis in his ear with those ear plugs, or Steve's reflection had shown somewhere.
"Huh."
"Nightmares," Steve volunteered at the non-answer.
"You're not the only one," Stark muttered very quietly, but Steve heard it anyway.
"Don't you have your appointment in the morning?"
"It is morning."
Steve rolled his eyes. "Later in the morning. 11 AM."
Stark never missed that appointment. He might get up late on any other day, but never on Tuesdays.
"Yes. Still happening. What business of yours is that anyway?" Stark gave him a wary look.
The other man shrugged. "None of my business. Just seems like a meeting you never miss."
Stark blew out a breath but didn't say anything. Recently, Steve had the feeling that he was walking on egg shells around Stark, more even than initially. He was moody, locking himself in his lab for days until Ms Potts ran intervention, then turned social to the extreme at galas and Avenger team nights at other times. Steve couldn't get a good read on him. He'd asked Natasha, since she had done his initial evaluation, but she had been tight-lipped.
Today he looked to be in one of his moods where he was best left alone. Steve told himself that the man was in a room shared by all Avengers, and couldn't expect to be left alone.
Steve retrieved the necessary equipment to practice his own shooting, and by the time he was ready to take a shot, Stark had disappeared.
Steve had been a bit surprised by Colonel Rhodes. If he had had to imagine a friend of Tony Stark's, he wouldn't have thought of someone like Rhodes first. But they meshed well, and Steve was glad that there was someone who could calm Tony down from his more manic moods.
Rhodes was a relatively frequent visitor to Avengers' Tower. His visits weren't predictable, and from what Steve gathered, War Machine was kept busy by the military, but it seemed that whenever he had a free minute, he would come by for a visit. He joined them for movie nights more often than Thor's girl Jane, much to Clint's amusement.
"Rhodey's my better half," Tony had only stated entirely seriously, and that had been that.
To get to the Avengers' living quarters, a visitor had to take the elevator to the Avengers' common floor first, then cross to another elevator and take that to the floor where they wanted to go. Whether Stark had intended that to be a security feature or not wasn't entirely clear to Steve, but either way, the Avengers generally knew who was coming and going.
Seeing Rhodes on a Monday wasn't a surprise in itself.
"Hey guys!"
Natasha and Steve were in the open kitchen, Natasha reading a borrowed engineering magazine, Steve getting a snack.
"Is Tony around?"
"Haven't seen him for a while," Natasha mused. "Should be in though."
"I saw him a couple of days ago at night. Or early morning rather," Steve offered.
Rhodes frowned. "Insomnia?"
"Seemed like it."
"Right. I'll see you later perhaps."
"We were planning on watching a movie tonight; remind Stark, would you?" Steve asked.
Rhodes didn't look too enthusiastic, but promised: "I will. Jarvis, where is he? Workshop?"
"Sir is in his bedroom. He muted me two days ago."
"Muted?"
Steve caught a strange look crossing Rhodes' face before he turned his back to continue on his way.
"Everything okay up there, Jarvis?" Natasha asked.
"Sir is uninjured," the AI intoned.
Natasha still made to rise from the bar, but Rhodey shook his head at her.
"Stay, I'll deal with it."
He disappeared in the elevator, and Natasha and Steve waited tensely for half an hour to hear who-knew-what. Then the Avengers alarm started blaring.
"Jarvis, is Iron Man suiting up?" Steve asked as he ran down to his own apartment to suit up.
"Sir hasn't given any instructions yet," the AI replied.
Steve went out on a limb. "Tell him that depending threat level he can sit this one out."
"I will convey the message."
In the end, Iron Man was there, and War Machine was on his heels. The two metal suits fought back to back, and Steve ended up being glad that they were both there. He would have to deal with the brass later; he figured that Rhodey hadn't had time to alert his higher ups about his outing with the Avengers.
Steve was not stupid. Some people in this day and age tended to think he was at the very least a bit naive, and while Steve might be ignorant sometimes and certainly young in non-ice years, he was not stupid.
During the War, he'd lost men. He'd lost many to bullets and grenades, four to gas, and one to his own hand. As Captain, Steve had written the notification letters home.
He was a good man and I was honored to serve with him.
He hadn't always written the same thing, obviously. There had definitely been parallels though, because when you were sitting over an empty page in a typewriter, you were thankful if someone your rank or higher gave you a hint of what to write. And then you didn't have to rack your brain as hard the next time you had to explain to a mother, a father, a wife, or whoever that the person they loved wouldn't be coming back alive.
Tobias Warner had been in his early twenties, and now that Steve was sitting on a couch with his drawing pad in hand and staring out the window in 2012 New York, he saw more similarities between Toby and Tony than the one letter difference in their names.
Toby had had moods. People – including Steve – gave him space when he fell into brooding, because when they did that thinking back on the people they had left behind, well, they wanted some space, too.
Then Toby had gotten some leave, and next thing Steve knew, he had been radioed in and watched as they draped a sheet over his body. Toby had put a gun to his head and pulled the trigger. And Steve had questioned himself for days where he could have gone different, what signs he'd missed that something bad was going on, all the while trying to delicately talk his men out of following those same thoughts and pointing fingers at themselves. There hadn't been time for that. Steve had been the Captain.
Now it was 2012, and Steve didn't feel as if he was any wiser. He'd talked to Bucky about it back then, trying to figure it out. He didn't have Bucky here and now (Steve had typed his last letter for him), but there was the Internet, so he used that trying to find answers.
Eventually, Colonel Rhodes came down to grab some of the leftover takeout from the fridge, and while it heated up in the microwave, Steve called him over to the common living room area.
"Can I talk to you, Colonel?"
"Sure, Captain."
They didn't usually call each other by rank unless it was about business. So Rhodey already had an inkling when he sat down on the couch across from him.
"It's about Tony." Briefly, Steve looked down at his drawing of the New York skyline and smudged a line before pulling himself and his Captain Rogers personality back together. "I'm going to take the plunge here and guess that he has a history of depression. And if I'm wrong I'd appreciate you telling me now because I've seen this go bad and I don't want that to happen again on my watch."
Rhodey considered him, but didn't do him the favor of showing any reaction.
Steve, figuring that he'd been right then, went on: "What can I do?"
Useless history note first: These days, Europe is remembering World War 1, where chemical warfare was used quite a lot. I wrote this story assuming that gas was used again as a weapon during World War 2 - I'm talking only about Europe here, and combat rather than concentration camps, where gas was obviously used. According to Wikipedia, I was wrong, because Nazi Germany didn't use chemical warfare, fearing that the other side would retaliate with more advanced chemicals. I left the bit about gas in anyway because Steve fought against Hydra, too, which could have used it.
Important note last: Depression is difficult to deal with on both sides. I'm not showing any advice here because I don't have any. If you or someone you know is dealing with depression, consider talking to a specialist. And I hope no one feels that I described it in any inappropriate way here; if you do, please leave me a comment. Other comments are of course also allowed.