i can't breathe
Sunday was gloomy.
A thick blanket of heavy clouds covered the sky, while rumblings in the distance warned of an impending storm. And while the whole doom-and-gloom vibe wasn't as bad as a Billie Holiday song, it was still palpable throughout the town.
Except for Loki, who was content to spend the dreary day cooped up in his room, monitoring the electronic communication channels of his peers and preparing for phase two of his plan.
No. Loki wasn't miserable at all. In fact, if someone were to walk past his bedroom door and listen closely, it is entirely plausible that they would be able to hear him humming.
A streak of lightning sliced through the darkened sky followed by a deafening crack of thunder, but Bruce could not be bothered by the foul weather. After a long night and morning of wandering the town, Bruce ended up on a park bench, unable to fight his way out of his scrambled thoughts.
His phone had died many hours prior to his arrival in the local park. Of this—and only this—Bruce was thankful. The battery's untimely end was furthered along by the constant buzzing of phone calls, texts, and notifications. There had been several from Tony, a few from Natasha, one from Clint, and Bruce eventually gave up keeping track. His only communication after leaving Tony's house was a phone call to his aunt letting her know that he would be spending the night at a friend's house. She didn't seem to mind; she never did.
Even when the rain started to fall, Bruce couldn't bring himself to care.
If his argument with Bruce was responsible for smothering Tony's joy at spending the day with Natasha, then this best friend's abrupt departure only made matters worse. If Tony was being honest with himself—a rarity, indeed—he hadn't been this depressed since his mother's accident.
After a moment of sulking on the floor by the front door, Tony's thoughts drifted back to the mysterious source responsible for sending Bruce the photo. Something about that didn't sit right with him. Shaking slightly and feeling a bit ill, Tony struggled to pull himself up off the floor and seek out his phone.
Clint was called first, and the conversation was troubling. Tony would've given anything for his new ally to be responsible. It would've been easier that way, reassuring, even. Clint's steadfast denial, coupled with his alarmed tone, left little doubt of his innocence. Troubling, indeed.
The roller coaster of emotions he'd experienced over the last hour left Tony feeling sick and exhausted. The parts of his body that weren't heavy or churning, were numb. It was as if his emotions were connected to a circuit board, which had overheated due to the rapid change from bliss to surprise to panic to guilt and now depression and had subsequently been fried. His lack of sleep the previous night wasn't helping. Even as tired as he was, Tony doubted he would get much rest that night; however, the brain cells that were still able to function under this kind of psychological and physiological stress reminded him that rest was necessary for…some reason or other (they couldn't quite remember).
Tony tossed and turned for as long as he could, but sleep evaded him. Eventually, he gave up and settled for wandering around the dark, empty mansion. Several times throughout the night, Tony found himself hovering outside the workshop but looking through the glass door at the unfinished Ultron project only reminded Tony why he was alone in the first place. He couldn't bring himself to enter.
Instead, he returned to his spot by the door, just in case Bruce returned.
One of the reasons Clint never quite liked Tony Stark, even before his mother's accident, was because of jealousy, pure and simple. Clint wasn't exactly dumb, but Stark made him look like an idiot child by comparison. Up until the moment he received the phone call from his former enemy, Clint had been happy to believe that his dislike of Stark was actually because of the way the genius teen acted—as if he was better than everyone because of his intelligence.
The phone call forced Clint to reevaluate that idea.
Hearing the uncertainty in Stark's voice about anything technologically-related left Clint lost and confused. If Tony Stark can't figure something out, then what hope was there for Clint? In the back of his mind, Clint knew he should be focused on the fact that either someone had hacked Natasha or one of her new friends was not to be trusted; instead, Clint could only focus on the feeling of despair that came from wishing Stark knew the answer.
But he had to tell Natasha. She needed to know.
The look on her face gave Clint an idea of how he must've looked after ending his call with Stark: lost and confused but also violated and possibly betrayed.
Naturally, she'd recovered—if you could call it that—faster than he had, and they'd spent the night verbally dissecting everything they could, hoping their conversation would lead to an epiphany—the identity of the traitor or hacker—but they eventually gave up.
Both unable to get any substantial sleep, they'd ended up huddled together on Natasha's bedroom floor. Occasionally, one of them would scramble up into a sitting position and present a new theory, just to have it shot down by the other one for whatever reason.
Both were exhausted by the time night gave way to the gray and dreary morning, and Clint returned to his room. No matter how he looked at the situation, he kept coming to the same conclusion: he'd failed Natasha, and that thought was eating him alive.
Steve had to steal Bucky's phone when he wasn't looking. It wasn't good for his best friend, who was already upset over everything with Natasha, to keep looking at that picture. The phone was switched off and safely hidden away during one of Bucky's more colorful rants, resulting in a diatribe aimed at him for hiding the device. When Bucky had finally calmed down, Steve waited for another verbal attack, but he was met with a Bucky-shaped lump transfixed at the foot of his bed.
For a while thereafter, Steve's thoughts were decidedly unfriendly towards Tony Stark and Natasha Romanoff. He was even struggling to think well of Clint Barton. They'd never been exactly close, but Clint was a part of their group. Until he showed up at the tryouts with Stark in tow, Steve had considered Clint a friend.
Given Bucky's unexpected history with the new girl and his current state, Steve felt obligated to treat their friendship as absolute. As long as this was the case, Clint and Natasha were to be kept at arms-length.
For Bucky's sake.
This is all your fault. This is all your fault. This is all your fault. This is all your fault.
The mantra circled through Bucky's thoughts for hours after Steve had stolen his phone. There were variations, but this is all your fault, was the basic premise.
If he hadn't just abandoned Natasha, they might still be together.
If they were still together, there wouldn't be a picture.
Bucky kept telling himself this again and again, but his thoughts occasionally strayed when the memory of the image flashed unbidden across his mind's eye.
Seeing Stark's arm wrapped around Natasha's shoulder and his head resting against hers had been enough, but it was Natasha's reaction that made Bucky regret every choice he'd made over the last year.
Natasha's smile wasn't just a 'say cheese' kind of smile. It was genuine and even brighter than he remembered. Even ensnared in Stark's grasp, Natasha's radiant joy was ethereal. She looked every inch like the beautiful warrior goddess he fell for the day they'd met—the one he was certain he'd never stop loving.
The first few times he'd reached this conclusion, Bucky fought back with a fierce determination. By the morning, however, just the thought rendered him temporarily incapable of breathing.
This can't be how it ends…
*Song Inspiration: "i can't breathe" - Bea Miller