A/N: On my way to this update, a seventh pen was sacrificed to appease my still-ongoing case of plot bunny-itis... there are worse things. **grin** (Also... it is a six hour time difference between New York and Berlin. Steve was talking to her at 9AM in Berlin...)


Daniel Baines prided himself in being an early riser, even on Saturdays, so he was usually up and at 'em between 5:30AM and Six. It gave him time to make the coffee, listen to the radio, and maybe read the morning paper... even if his grandaunt-in-law was up too. Even then, they could spend a quiet hour in the kitchen, occasionally swapping stories. Sometimes he wondered if she'd started to go senile, what with how often she slipped into Romanian in conversation, but by all accounts she was still sharp as a tack in her nineties and definitely not demented. It didn't stop him from wondering sometimes, though.

It was with those thoughts that he entered the kitchen and found her wearing scrubs (she never seemed to wear anything else... and these ones were VeggieTales-Themed), reading glasses on, engrossed in a thick book while taking notes and muttering to herself about government stupidity. "Becca?"

Rebecca glanced up at him with a frown. "What? This thing reads like stereo instructions! Good morning, Dan."

"Did you even go to sleep?" He knew she'd worked a 10-hour shift yesterday, and then the craziness with the international news...

"Yes. Steve woke me up at 4AM with a phone call. I tried going back to bed after that, but..." She sighed. "Knowing it's being handled doesn't help my nerves any."

He eyed the book. "What is that thing?"

She held it up so he could see the cover. "Government idiocy. Steve dropped this off on his way to the funeral."

"Which you're still upset about not being able to go to."

"Yes, because he needed more support than just Sam. Not that just having Sam around isn't enough support..." She shrugged.

Daniel smiled at that and took a moment to consider the implications of the situation if she'd actually been able to go to London with Steve and Sam Wilson... and silently thanked the universe for small favors as he joined her at the table. "So was the call good or bad?"

"Both. He promised to put Bucky on the phone as soon as he possibly could. Yahweh only knows when that'll be."

That was good news, but... "So how much sleep did you actually get?"

"Six hours."

Daniel nodded slowly. "Right."


His wife was just getting out of bed when Daniel re-entered their bedroom and sat down on the edge of the bed. She frowned at him. "Are we out of coffee? I could have sworn I bought enough..."

Daniel ran a hand through his hair, smiled. "No, nothing like that, Miriam. It's just... I don't know what Steve told her when he called, but she's sitting at the kitchen table reading the Sokovia Accords book and waiting for a phone call. This is going to be a really long day."

Miriam frowned again. "How much sleep did she say she'd had?"

"Six hours."

Miriam smiled. "Good. Think we need to distract her?"

"Yes."

"I'll see what I can do," she said as she reached for the phone on her bedside table. "It's not every day that we need a distraction because a family member has been accused of international terrorism."

"Think her shift supervisor will believe you?"

"It's Aunt Becca, who could probably stage an international incident if she tried hard enough. While wearing her skunk scrubs."

Daniel paused. "Good point. Warn them that she's wearing VeggieTales."

"I'm going to have Bob and Larry staring at me for breakfast? How'd she even find where I hid them?!"

"As you pointed out: It's Becca."


Following two different leads, detectives from two different police precincts in Berlin met up at the same hotel, on investigating the origin of an electromagnetic pulse device that had knocked out the power in East Berlin several minutes, the other concerning a case of identity theft on a United Nations official.

A woman at the front desk greeted them and smiled when asked about the box that had been picked up by the delivery driver, for one of her patrons, a nice man who seemed to order the exact same thing every morning for breakfast without fail. Upon hearing the detectives concerns, she led them straight to Mister Mueller's hotel room, as the dear man had nothing to hide, aside from his love of black coffee and bacon.

A minute later, she was proved utterly wrong when they discovered the contents of the bathroom...


When they got to the cell, the first thing Tony did was rush over and pull the power cord feeding power to the restraints. Then he peered in at Bucky to see that he was unconscious, but his hands were opening and closing with jerking motions. "Wilson? How long since he passed out?"

"Two minutes," Sam told him as Director Ross got the door of the cage open and let him in to get a better look at the man. "He's breathing, that's good."

"Are you-" Director Ross started to ask.

"Pararescue," Sam told him as he visually assessed the stiffness of his patient beneath the restraints, then sighed in relief when the man's entire body relaxed, and started taking vitals. "Learned some pointers from a very good nurse, too. Pulse of 55..." He watched Bucky breathe, glanced at his watch. "Respirations 15." He pulled a penlight out of his pocket and checked Bucky's eyes. "Equal and reactive, kinda sluggish. Not surprised, seeing as he was sitting in this thing, being shocked for hours."

Everett Ross winced. "Containment."

"There's a big difference between containment and torture, Director." Sam noticed Bucky starting to blink and pulled back slightly as the man opened his eyes and stared at him blankly. "Hey there." He held up two fingers. "How many fingers, Barnes?"

Bucky stared at him blankly. "Flapjacks."

Sam frowned. "Yeah?"

"Flapjacks." His head lolled to the side and he looked at Tony. "Want flapjacks, Commander." Then his eyes rolled back in his head and he passed out again.

Sam looked at him in confusion before glancing at Tony, and Steve who was standing at Tony's shoulder. "Flapjacks?"

"Better question. Commander whom?" Tony wondered. "And was that seizure caused by the electrical pulses, do you think?"

"Yes," Steve said, causing Tony to jump at how close he was. "He was having absence seizures every time the pulse went off. Only I didn't know about the pulses and thought he was just really withdrawn. And Sam?" Here Steve pulled something out of his coat pocket with his free hand and handed it to him. "If he has another one, give that to him."

Sam took the blister things and stared at it for a moment. "Why do you have orally disintegrating Clonazepam?"

"Because Becca had concerns after seeing the kinds of medication they had on hand for him at the bank vault, and had a long talk with one of her doctor colleagues. One of the uses for Clonazepam is treatment of seizure disorders. Those are 2mg. He might need two, because... metabolism." Steve glanced at Tony. "And he thought you were Rumlow. In Bucky's defense, you do kind of look like him."

Tony frowned. "Right. And he wants pancakes?"

"Apparently." Steve's phone suddenly beeped and he pulled it out to stare at the text message... "Oh, thank God. Miriam bought us ten hours and somehow got Becca called into work. I wonder how she managed that?"

Natasha, standing next to a very confused Director Ross, smiled. "The Truth? 'Help! My aunt's brother has been accused of international terrorism and we need a distraction!'"

"Isn't she 92?" Tony asked.

Steve chuckled. "She's a nurse and still working three days a week."

"Oh. So this Miriam person is basically distracting her with sick people."

"Yep."

"How has Natasha met this woman and I haven't, Steve?"

Steve chuckled again, a wry expression on his face. "Because you've got a reputation she doesn't like and has said no at every attempt I made to get her to the Tower to meet you, but Pepper's slowly changing her mind on the matter."

"Pepper?"

"Yeah."

Sam's attention was taken again by Bucky opening his eyes and looking at him funny. "Hi. Back with us now?"

Bucky looked at him for a long moment before his gaze shifted to Tony and Steve, and he asked a question in Russian. "Prodolzhit' missiyu plana podrobno, Komandir?"

"Guess not."

Steve frowned. "Did he just ask something about a mission plan or report, Nat?"

"Yes."

He nodded. "Yes, Soldat. We want a mission report. Or plan."

What followed was a rapid-fire story in Russian that only Natasha was able to follow, and at the end of it, she was staring at him in wonder. "Spasibo, Soldat. Steve, he thinks you're Pierce and this is seven years ago. Before Odessa. Though how, exactly, a nuclear scientist becomes a doctor about to release a plague, I have no idea."

"As in former Secretary of Defense Alexander Pierce?" Everett Ross asked.

"Yes, Director. Did you not know about Alexander Pierce being HYDRA, or that SHIELD was in possession of the Winter Soldier for fifteen years? Surely, the CIA has better intel than that." She nodded when Bucky mumbled something at her in question. "Dva goda nazad, Soldat."

Everett Ross sighed. "No, I was just asking for clarification. Wait. Fifteen years?"

"Near as we could figure it, yes."

"Nataliya?"

Natasha's eyes widened and she stared at Bucky again. "Yasha?"

Sam watched as Bucky nodded before his eyes rolled back and he passed out yet again. "Steve, I don't think we'll be needing the Klonopin."

"Put it in your pocket, then. Director, can we please get him out of this thing?"

"No," Natasha answered for him.

Steve turned to look at her funny. "Why not?"

"He's slipping between past and present. In Odessa he did not know me. There before he passed out again, he did."

"Good point."

Director Ross was saved from the confoundingness of the scene in front of him when Sharon Carter entered the interrogation cell and handed him a tablet. "What is this?"

"Read," she told him smugly.

He frowned and did so... and then his eyes widened. "Captain?"

"What?"

"Berlin police found the actual United Nations psychiatrist, a mask of Barnes's face, and a wig in the Colonel's hotel room... and they mention an EMP device that was supposed to be delivered to a power station, but the delivery driver got stuck in traffic and it went off somewhere else." The director paused. "An EMP? What kind of stupid plan was this?"

Tony frowned at him. "He was going to use a pinch? Really? That's... so dumb it could have worked."

"What's a pinch and why is it dumb?" Steve asked.

"You still have that catch-up notebook?" Sam asked patiently.

"Yes..."

"Give it to Stark. He needs to write something in it."

Steve handed his catch-up notebook to Tony, who jotted something down and handed it back to him. Steve read it with a frown. "Ocean's Eleven?"

"You wanted to know what a pinch is. That's the easiest explanation, and then you will understand why it's a plan just dumb enough to work." Tony glanced at the other notebook Steve was still holding. "Natasha?"

"Yes?"

"If the power had gone out with the Colonel in here, with that book in his possession..."

"Bad," she answered gravely.

Steve paused and turned to look at Everett Ross. "Wait. You said a wig?"

"Yes. Why?"

Steve smiled. "Because that was one of Becca's complaints about the video that the Task Force released. That Bucky has way better hair, even when he was in HYDRA's clutches." At Sharon's frown, he shrugged. "Cell phone footage from the causeway in DC."

"Oh."

Tony put the eyelink glasses back on and asked FRIDAY to compare... "She's right. In the video, it's too flat and even, and the mask is clean-shaven."

Director Ross blinked in surprise again. "Oh."

"Come on, Director," Sharon told him. "We have a man to fully interrogate, a press release to write about this mess, and a man's name to clear. I'll even let you play bad cop if you want."

Tony smirked. "No, let the cat king play bad cop, staring at the guy from the corner."

"Can't do that," Everett told him. "He's not a member of the task force."

"So deputize him temporarily. Just... watch him carefully, as it was his father that died, and he was willing to kill Barnes here based solely on the evidence of a bad video."

Ross nodded. "That could work."

Steve watched them go and then returned his attention to Sam as he started to take Bucky's vitals again. "How is he?"

"Not having another seizure, thank goodness," Sam muttered. "Pulse of 48, respirations... 17, not labored. Eyes... equal and reactive, if still sluggish. If he'd been having absence seizures triggered by those pulses, no matter how weak or strong they were, for hours, it doesn't surprise me that he's passing out repeatedly and also mentally discombobulated." He paused and looked back at Natasha. "And what was Odessa?"

"Painfully creative," she told him, then blinked when her stomach rumbled.

Steve sighed. "Go get something to eat with Natasha, Sam. We'll make sure he doesn't swallow his tongue in the mean time."

"You sure?"

"Yes."

"Okay." Sam climbed out of the cage and offered an arm to Natasha. "Lead the way, fair lady?"


At home in Brooklyn, Miriam received a text message back from Captain Rogers. "I don't know how you managed it, but from Sam and myself (and Bucky when he wakes up again... don't ask): THANK YOU! We are probably going to NEED those ten hours!"

"Who are you getting a text message from at this hour?" Rebecca wondered as she paused at the kitchen counter, with her keys and purse in hand. Thankfully, she'd changed out of the hated VeggieTales scrubs, though Miriam wasn't sure if regulation Ceil Blue was actually an improvement or not.

"A friend. Has a long, long day ahead of them, from the sound of it."

"Oh?"

"Yeah. Have a good shift?"

Rebecca stared at her for a moment and Miriam's resolve to stay silent on the matter nearly broke. Then she shrugged and left without another word.


They'd been alone for five minutes when Steve's curiosity won out and he finally had to ask about Howard and his wife. "You mentioned you got those pens out of Howard's archives, and I only knew him when he was young and single. I didn't get to meet your mother, Tony. So... I'm asking." He glanced at Bucky, still passed out.

Tony stared at him for half a minute before fiddling with his watch/computer link, and then showed him pictures. "You do realize we're on camera, right?"

"Small talk?"

"Good time for it. There. That's Mom."

Steve stared at the image of an older woman standing with Howard in a blue dress, while Howard himself was wearing a goofy holiday sweater. "When is that from?"

"Christmas of 1980. Dad never wore that sweater around me, but Jarvis got a picture of it." Tony tapped the watch again and another photo replaced it. "This is from November 1991, at a SHIELD function."

Steve was about to say something when words repeated in Russian reached them, and they both turned to find Bucky staring at nothing, repeating the same three words in a cycle. "Huh?"

"On znal menya..."

Tony frowned, listened to the translation that FRIDAY was feeding him. "All right... who knew him and why does he look so shocked?"

Steve looked from Bucky to the images and back again. "He must have woken up right when you started showing me those."

Tony froze. "I triggered him into some kind of flashback?"

"Apparently one where someone knew him." He reached in and shook Bucky's knee. "Come back to us now, Buck." The cadence suddenly changed and then Bucky went silent, still staring at nothing. "Bucky?"

Bucky's head whipped to the side, he stared at the wall for a moment, then he blinked and looked straight at Steve. "The man on the bridge. Who was he?"

Tony frowned. "Is that code for something?"

"I knew him."

"No, Tony. This is a different flashback. And he's not hearing us."

"How do you know it's a flashback?"

"Because Becca made Rumlow tell us what he knew."

Bucky's face morphed into an expression one would qualify as nauseated. "But I knew him." And then he passed out again with a gasp.

Tony paused. "So..."

Steve immediately went for the restraints when Bucky started to convulse, got him out of the restraints, out of the cage, and into a position on his side on the floor away from the cage that would best protect his airway. "Director Ross can be mad at me later for taking their thing apart like that!"

Tony nodded. "Agreed. So what do you think is going on here?"

"Bad flashbacks." The "duh" in his tone made Tony wince. "And from what Rumlow said, about him remembering me after we were attacked on the Causeway, Pierce ordered Bucky wiped." He sighed in relief when the shaking stopped.


When Bucky awoke again, he found himself laying on his right side, looking at the floor, while Natalia sang softly in Russian somewhere above him. He blinked for a moment, wondering why he was on the floor in this odd position. The last thing he remembered was Steve talking to a man and pictures, and before that, the flying man in front of him asking how many fingers. He lifted his head to look around and found Natalia sitting on his right, and Steve sitting on his left, back against the wall with his eyes closed. "Steve?"

Steve startled, opened his eyes and looked at him. "Hi."

"I want some plums."

Natalia laughed softly. "Plums?"

"Yeah. What of it?"

"Nothing. Pretty sure the cafeteria here has fruit salad."

Steve reached into his jacket and pulled out a meal bar. "Will this do until we can get you some fruit?"

Bucky rolled and sat up, took the bar from him and stared at the wording on the wrapper. "Dumbass Super Soldier Meal Supplement Bar?"

"Tony named them."

"What is this?"

"It's a bit like an MRE, only better-tasting."

Bucky frowned at him. "Why do you have MRE's in your jacket?"

Natalia smiled. "Because it's the lesser of two evils, and usually he only packs those for missions. What did you do, Steve? Take an entire box to the funeral?"

"If I say yes, do you promise not to tell Becca that I did? She hates it when I do that."

Bucky blinked. "Becca?"

Steve glanced at his watch. "We are four hours into our ten hour window. What do you think, Nat?"

"I say tell him."

Steve smiled. "Okay, then." He pulled out his phone and fiddled with it for a moment while Bucky looked at him funny, then handed him the cell phone. "That's Becca."

Bucky looked at the phone to find a picture of an elderly woman standing next to the flying man he'd kicked off of the helicarrier... wearing a brown top with lots of half-circle things. He frowned, at once finding her familiar, and yet not. Her eyes were familiar, at least. "I don't understand."

"Imagine dark hair and significantly less wrinkles. Younger," Steve told him. "And a nursing cap, white."

In his mind's eye, suddenly he didn't have to imagine. He knew her. "Is this... Rebecca? My sister?"

"It sure is. And she's probably going to cuss a blue streak when she finds out that the containment chair they had you in was shocking you and sending you into petit mal seizures."

Bucky handed the phone back to him with a frown. "You mean, she's alive?"

"Yep. And I promised to put you on the phone with her ASAP, but you went into seizures and flashbacks and we couldn't do that, and then Miriam solved it for us by getting Becca called into work on her day off." Steve smiled at him. "So it'll be five hours from now instead."

Bucky joined Steve in leaning against the wall, and then noticed a sticker stuck to his metal hand. "What is this?"

Natalia smiled. "Tony inspected your arm while you were out, found a couple trackers and also four other things, called it an interesting work of engineering, and then asked for something cute to decorate it with."

"And a cat sticker was all anyone could find?"

"Yes."

"Why does this cat look so grumpy?"

"Because it's the Facebook Grumpy Cat."

Bucky paused. "What is Facebook?"

Steve smirked. "Something we had to tear Vision away from because he kept getting into arguments with teenagers. Internet social website."

"Who is Vision?"

Steve continued to smile. "Now that, that is a longer explanation. Think six-foot tall purple one year old, personality a little bit like a butler. Walks through walls."

Bucky turned to stare at him. "What?"

"It's a really long story, Buck, and you've had a bad day, complete with seizures and flashbacks, because a guy from what used to be Sokovian Intelligence Black Ops framed you, and apparently wanted to go where ever the Winter Soldier lab is, to somehow bring down an empire. Explaining Vision can wait until we have time to do it properly."

The guy from before with the pictures and the flying guy and a blonde woman joined them right then. "Oh good. You're up, finally."

"Finally?" Bucky wondered as he looked up at him, then winced as a memory hit him of that same older man who had been in the pictures.

"Yes, finally. You were in and out for four hours." He pulled up a chair and sat down. "I'm Tony, by the way. And you can stop wincing now, Barnes."

"Memory."

"Got that part when you were repeating yourself ad nauseum in Russian. Knew you how?"

"Tony," Steve cautioned.

"No, Steve. I think this is something he needs to say."

"Super soldier serum," Bucky finally said. "Mission. 1991. Howard knew me. Beyond that, I still don't remember much about it." Everybody stared at him. "What?"

Tony nodded slowly, glanced at Natalia, then looked at Steve, who was staring at Bucky in disbelief. "Neither of you knew that part?"

"No," Steve told him. "Howard was working on the serum again? After it got Erskine killed, right in front of him?"

"A lot of people tried it, Steve. Barnes, do you know what happened after that?"

Bucky frowned. "I know I helped train soldiers, but don't remember the circumstances. You... you're not mad?"

Tony looked at him calmly. "Wouldn't say I'm not, exactly. But... whatever ever happened back there, I don't think getting mad at you would solve anything, because from what I've seen so far..."

"Tony?" Steve asked, tone uncertain.

"Insane plan to kill twenty million people? Your getting waylaid for seventy years in the arctic? Treatment so bad it results in full-body convulsive seizures? No."

Bucky stared at him. "But..."

"Watched you pass out repeatedly while having flashbacks, made you accidentally have a flashback that resulted in another one, which led to you having another seizure from what Steve was pretty sure was the memory of being in that chair thing they put you in. About the only thing you didn't do was have a panic attack, and you'd have probably had that, too, if you had woken up in that thing again. No, Barnes. The only people I'm upset with over this right now are the International Terrorism Task Force and HYDRA."

Bucky blinked up at him, dumbfounded. "Oh."

"And I'll have to study that notebook that Steve put in his jacket pocket a little bit, but... I might have just the thing for you. Maybe."

"What notebook?" Bucky asked as he looked at Steve, who pulled it out with a sigh and showed it to him. "Where did that thing come from?"

"Cleveland," Steve told him. "By way of our bomber who had a plan, as Tony put it, so dumb it could have worked." He motioned to the meal bar still in Bucky's hand. "Eat."

"Is there a reason..." And then his stomach rumbled, and he blushed.

"Yes. Metabolism. Passing out to be avoided."

"Right." As he started to eat the meal bar, another man joined them, this one in a suit similar to Tony's, and leaned against the table situated in front of the containment cage he'd been in.

"How can we help you, Director?" Steve asked cheerfully.

The director watched them for a minute before shrugging and tossing a thick envelope to Steve. "The task force is releasing Sergeant Barnes into Avengers Custody, Captain, pending his official pardon, as it is well known how he went missing in action and was presumed dead, and is quite possibly the longest ever serving Prisoner of War." His gaze traveled to Bucky's metal hand. "And I'm curious. Did it happen in the fall?"

Bucky stared back at him for a moment. "I think so?"

"You don't know?"

"Not a lot about it, no." He glanced at Steve. "This is a really odd thing to wonder, but is that blue coat at the Smithsonian my spare?"

Steve nodded. "That, or Howard had another one made. "Why?"

"It's one of the things I remembered right off, while there... that I loved that coat. Wanted to steal it, even if I didn't actually know at the time why I wanted to steal it."

The flying guy chuckled. "It would have made finding your easier if you had, because everybody in America would have been on the look out. National treasure, you know?"

"I was amnesic, not stupid, Mr. Flying Man."

"Sam," he told him, then pointed to the blonde lady. "Sharon. You've met Director Ross."

Steve frowned at Ross. "What do you mean our custody?"

"I mean that this is your purview, Captain, and he's not wanted for the bombing, or anything else... that we know of. Unless you actually were wandering around, targeting HYDRA agents that were prominent, Sergeant."

Bucky shook his head. "No. Why? Did someone think I was?"

Sharon nodded. "We had a string of deaths, all prominent people. A year or so ago."

"Oh."

"If you're releasing him to our custody," Steve began. "Does that mean we can go?"

"It does."

Steve smiled, looked at Tony. "Call Pepper."

"We're on a break, Steve."

"So?"


Miriam received another text and had to stop typing to look at it: "We'll be in New York in six hours or less. Stark Tower. Hopefully, she'll forgive us for not calling her if we actually have him with us." She stared at it, looked down at her keyboard for a long moment, then sighed in relief. As her aunt would say... "Thank Yahweh!"


Translation... Russian (google translate):

Dva goda nazad, soldat: Two years ago, soldier
Spasibo: Thank you
prodolzhit' missiyu plana podrobno, Komandir?: continue mission plan detail, commander?
on znal menya: he knew me

Notes: For those unfamiliar with alternate drug names: Clonazepam and Klonopin are the same thing and Sam would know this, as he's a VA councilor/Pararescueman (As it's a scheduled drug, however, the story of just how Rebecca got a prescription for it is likely longer than "had a chat with a colleague.") Also, the containment chair he was in DID have an electrical component to keep the arm in check during CACW... I didn't make that up.