A/N: I got a guest review asking when I was going to update this – which, okay, sorry guys – but also, this kind of review does annoy me a little. I've got a busy life, y'all, and I'm not making any money off of this. So yeah, I put this away because I hit a bit of a block on it, but I'm never going to abandon a fic! Just, y'know, patience, I guess. Also, writing reviews just to ask when I'm going to finish this doesn't really help. If anything, it makes me feel worse that I haven't posted. At the very least say something nice before you demand more.

Ugh, sorry for the rant. Anyway, all that to say I have written another chapter, I hope you all like it, and thanks for reading! :)


Natalia found him right after Steve left.

She looked at his shuddering and broken body unemotionally, and then said, "I thought so."

He just glared at her.

"When you're tired, you tend to protect your left a little more," she said, going over to where they kept the first aid kit. Coming from her, 'a little bit' probably meant it was barely noticeable, but still. Bucky was ashamed at his weakness.

She knelt by his wing and glanced at him for permission. He hated it, but it was necessary.

He gave her a tight nod, and then scrunched his eyes shut and turned his face away. Within seconds, he passed out, and when he woke, she was gone, and he was alone.

He took his opportunity and disappeared.


Tony dropped his head on his workbench and groaned.

He didn't know what to do.

How do you go about finding a super-soldier assassin that didn't want to be found?

You don't, Tony had discovered, over the last week and a half. The former Winter Soldier had all but disappeared. Tony only knew he was still in the Tower because Jarvis was able to confirm that he was sleeping in his bed every night. How he got there without tripping any of his AI's sensors along the way, or any of Steve's senses, they didn't know.

Steve had been worried, too, because the silent avoidance treatment extended to him as well. Tony had to convince him, after the first few nights made it apparent that Bucky could sneak past everything to get to his bed, that he should just go to bed himself instead of trying to catch Bucky at it every night.

If he had to wait to talk, so be it. He'd wait until Bucky got complacent, and then he'd find him.


It was weeks before Bucky started letting his guard down again, feeling a little more prepared to face the others.

He wasn't, however, prepared to be ambushed by Tony in the middle of the night, in the common room (again, how was he doing that?).

"They clipped my primaries," Tony blurted. Bucky's head shot up, and he looked, alarmed, at the large feathers on the outer edges of Tony's wings.

"In Afghanistan. Took months for them to grow back," Tony clarified, and Bucky relaxed again, although he was confused.

"What're you tellin' me this for?"

Tony paused. "I don't know," he said. "Maybe I just… know a little how you feel?"

"Know a little how I feel," Bucky scoffed, and it was like something broke loose. "I can't fly to save my life, my memory's blown to shit, everyone I used to know is dead except Steve, and I've got the blood of hundreds of people - hell, who even knows, maybe thousands, on my hands."

Tony stared at him for few seconds. "Couple hundred thousand."

"Scuse me?"

"That's my count, give or take. I can't really be sure of the final numbers either, considering all the double dealing." He grimaced. "They called me Merchant of Death, once. Some still do."

"That's… not the same," Bucky argued.

"It's not really much different," Tony said with a shrug, and flopped on the couch next to him. His wings fluttered anxiously, like they wanted to curl around him again, but they didn't. Bucky hated himself for wanting to feel those feathers.

"I killed your parents," Bucky reminded him harshly, hoping it would make him go away. Tony didn't even seem to be fazed.

"Would you kill them right now?"

"What?"

"If they were alive, right now, standing in front of you, would you kill them?"

"No!"

"See? There you go," Tony said, like he'd proved a point. Maybe he had, to himself. Bucky still wasn't sure what it was.

"You don't care?" he asked, still trying to figure him out.

"No, I do care," Tony said, frustration evident in his tone. "It's just… look, I was a terrible person, before Afghanistan. I'm still not a great person, but whatever. Lots of people gave me second chances, third chances, so on. I finally took the opportunity to try to be better, and… well, it would be pretty shitty of me not to offer you the same."

Bucky stared at him, but Tony's gaze didn't waver. Bucky broke first, ripping his eyes away to stare out the window into the dark night.

"Let me look at it," Tony said, softly. Bucky just shook his head. "I might be able to – "

"You can't do nothin', Stark," Bucky practically growled at him, and felt a perverse sense of satisfaction when the other man visibly drew back a little.

"Sorry, sorry," the genius said quickly, "I won't do anything, totally understand, boundaries and stuff, those are important, and – "

"S'not you," Bucky grumbled, because he really hated the self-deprecating apology spiral that Stark frequently went into. "I can't even look at it."

Even right now he could feel the damaged wing pressing up against his back and he shivered a little.

"I – we can work around that," Tony said after a brief pause. "If you want. J can just scan you. No touching, promise."

Bucky froze, thinking. If he closed his eyes and it was just Jarvis, then maybe –

"I'll think about it," he told Tony, voice a bit hoarse.

"Okay," said Tony, and Bucky could hear his excitement. "Just, uh, let me know. Or, I mean, you know your way to the lab, so. Oh, and could you maybe also think about talking to Steve, too? He keeps hanging around and sighing and making puppy dog eyes," Bucky snorted at that, which Tony seemed to take as encouragement, "and being mopey, it's just, really, I can't get any work done anymore, help a guy out, yeah?"

"Yeah," he said. "I'll think about it."