'Oh God, I'm so tired
Of being afraid.
What would it feel like
To put this baggage down?
If I'm being honest
I'm not sure I'd know how.'
"Six" ~ Sleeping At Last
One week later…
The irony isn't lost on Steve that he's getting quite good at escaping hospitals.
It is laughably easy, once everyone leaves for the front lobby where the UN will be coming to take Bucky into custody, to give Bruce the slip and hobble to the elevator.
He hardly has to think where he's going. It's like a sonar ping to locate the target of his thoughts.
He does wish he wasn't in sweatpants and a blue scrub shirt for this meeting, but he takes what he can get. At least he's got shoes on this time.
The elevator doors ding, sliding open.
Steve's breath seizes. He feels like he's facing Erskine's lab for the first time, wondering what he's getting himself into.
Squaring his shoulders, he pushes on the handle and is floored that it's unlocked. That he isn't barricaded from this room.
For once, it's completely silent. No music. No chatter. The bots are powered down in their corner, machines dim.
It's a bitter echo of last week, when he found Tony hunched in front of a screen.
This time Tony is scrunched over a lab table, tiny screwdriver working at the busted reactor. Steve knows full well that Tony's got a stock of these, that he can just as easily throw this one out.
The fact he's determined to fix it makes Steve feel like he's aged ten years.
"You think you can come down here and an inspirational speech will change my mind?"
Steve shakes his head, even though Tony can't see him. "I'm not here to justify my actions. Or change your mind."
Tony swivels on the stool. He leans his elbow on the table, head propped on his knuckles. He just looks dead tired now, so exhausted Steve feels his own injuries throb in sympathy. They're both a sorry sight.
Steve lets some of his vulnerability show, the young man inside an old body. "I came to say I'm sorry."
Tony doesn't quip back, astonishing Steve for the second time that day.
"You tried to tell me, on the quinjet to Siberia."
Steve nods. "You deserved the truth. I'm the real monster here, for not having the courage to tell you sooner. I just…I've always thought of Bucky and the killer who did those things as two different people."
Tony's eyes are unreadable.
Steve has only taken one dance class in his life and it was a disaster. He always found himself dizzy when the dance ended, the final twirl and dip. That vertigo sinking as the ground rushed up too fast.
Now, the dance that has been between him and Tony, all along, is winding down and Steve is still spinning.
"It's always been you," Steve blurts, the words sounding like they belong to someone else. "Always you."
Tony's brows shoot up, his own surprise showing, but Steve plows right over him.
"I thought I hated this new century with its noises. Its constant light and talking and brash privilege." Steve sits heavily on the edge of the table. "I looked at you and for a while it was easier to think of you as the epitome of everything I hated. Everything that was wrong with the world."
Steve snorts, a bitter and self loathing sound. Tony looks down at his hands.
"Really, Tony, you're everything I wish I could be."
Tony keeps his head down but Steve has known him long enough to recognize the crinkling between his eyes and around his temples. He's shocked.
"You're excitable and smart and untainted, at least where it counts in helping people. I've become…jaded in a way you haven't."
"Unattainable," Tony murmurs.
Steve nods. "Exactly."
"No, I mean, that's what my dad said about you."
Steve blinks.
"That's what you've always been to me," says Tony. "Something unattainable."
Steve shakes his head. "That's foolish. I'm no better than anybody else, and I mean that honestly. I might be stronger physically but not in character."
Tony's eyes are exposed for a split second and then he seems to catch himself, closing off. "What does this have to do with Barnes?"
Steve stands. "I'm saying all this because it's me asking you not to change what's so good about you—don't let the truth of your parents ruin how kind you are, your level of trust in the world, your generosity."
Steve's chest cinches so tight he thinks it might collapse right there. He takes one long, sad look around the lab, his last, trying to memorize the details.
Tony sighs, a sound that has Steve wanting to place a hand on his knee. He resists and simply nods at the mechanic.
"Stay safe, Tony."
Tony's eyes snap back up. "Wait—are you…you're leaving with Barnes?"
Steve shakes his head again…then nods. "Temporarily, until this mess is sorted. But I'm not abandoning Peter. If forced to choose, I'll take him every time, even if you kick me out and I have to visit him on weekends or something."
Tony's eyes are back to that poker face but Steve wonders what has him going so still.
"And for what it's worth," says Steve, younger sounding than he likes, "I have always been, and always will be, your friend, Tony. That wasn't a lie."
Having said his piece, he rides the elevator back up.
The others are gathered in a circle in the sunlit lobby. Bucky isn't restrained but Rhodes stands at his side, rifle over one shoulder. They're both relaxed, with the knowledge that Bucky has no desire to escape and even if he did, he's surrounded by some of the deadliest people on this planet.
He wouldn't make it two inches to the door.
Natasha and Peter are the only ones sitting, Peter in his wheelchair beside Bucky and Nat on a visitor's chair, pointing out mistakes in the Spanish homework on his lap.
"Hey, Frodo."
Peter looks up at Steve's approach. "Steve! You're not supposed to be moving around yet."
"Thanks, Mom." Steve laughs at Peter's eye roll and kisses his messy hair, savouring that too, fretting over how long it will be before he can do it again. He hides his grief. "Did you have a good visit with Ned?"
"Yeah! He just left but he dropped off the three weeks' homework I missed." Peter makes a face and the adults hide their snickers. "He cried more than all of you put together. Bruce had to make him some hot cocoa."
Bruce smiles. "Never harsh on the medicinal powers of chocolate."
Clint folds his arms with a smirk. "That's what his MJ friend always says."
"That's because she's highly intelligent," says Nat, erasing one of Peter's conjugations. "Try number eight again."
Peter does but even Steve can tell his heart's not in it. He steals glances at Bucky.
When the man catches him doing it, he kneels to be at Peter's eye level. "We'll be alright, bud. Us old fogies can handle ourselves."
"What do you mean 'us,' Bucky?" Peter looks stricken. He grabs Steve's hand. "You're going too?"
Steve swallows back a lump in his throat. "Just for a little while, Peter. I just got my oldest friend back. I'm making sure he gets a fair trial and then I'll come right back. I promise."
"Are you going to…live here with us anymore?"
Steve fights to muster a smile. "Probably not, bud. Don't you worry about it."
"Too late," Sam mutters, looking upset too.
Peter might as well have been shot again for how devastated he looks. "You said this was home!"
"It was, Pete. You are." Steve glances at Rhodes. "But I'm not sure Tony feels the same way and it's his house, so to speak."
"Then I'm coming with you!"
The adults all talk over each other, trying to quench that thought before it can take root in Peter's mind.
"No, son." Steve untangles his fingers from Peter, feeling like he's killing the boy slowly. "You need to stay here and go to that science fair and teach Nat how to make real salsa and a whole bunch of other things part of being a normal kid. I wouldn't dare take that away from you."
Nat shifts forward and Steve thinks she's going to flick his ear for the salsa comment but she pulls him into a one armed hug instead.
She whispers in his ear. "You know how to call me for help if things get sticky. Love you."
Steve nods, not trusting himself to speak. Peter's started to sniffle.
Everyone turns when the elevator doors ring again. They're all flabbergasted to see Tony, who Steve figured would wait to come out when this was over. He's avoided Bucky's presence since that day. No reason to quit now.
"Tony?" he calls.
Then he sees that Tony has a cellphone to one ear, rectangular fiberglass case in the other hand. His jaw is stony but his eyes have that unique spark and they're locked on Steve.
"Yes, you heard me right," he barks to someone on the other end. "This morning, just like I said. Barnes escaped custody and is in the wind. Even my systems can't track him."
Steve stands, a full body shiver going through him. They all stare at Tony, even Peter, the pencil dropping from his lax fingers.
Did I just hallucinate that? Did Tony just…
"Why didn't I tell you before now?" Tony's lips curl into the harsh but genuine beginnings of a smile. A shared smile between he and Steve. Steve echoes it, legs turning to jelly. "Because we didn't notice before now. You'd better turn back and start a search! Hop to it!"
Tony hangs up even though Everett is still audibly yelling into the other end.
They're turned to marble again, just like in the boardroom, so bowled over by this that no one wants to break the ice-thin moment.
It is Bucky who shoulders past Rhodes and Clint to stop in front of Tony.
Former killer and orphan gaze at each other and have a conversation with just their eyes that even Steve can't decrypt.
"You didn't have to do that," says Bucky aloud, finally. "It's the least I deserve."
Tony nods. "That's certainly what the Winter Soldier deserves."
Stark's eyes again find Steve. He shares a woeful, conspirator's look, then glances at Peter. His eyes melt. "But a wise little teenager helped me see that you're just as much a victim of this as I am."
Peter's slack jaw lifts in a hesitantly hopeful expression.
Tony's chin ticks. "I won't pretend that this is easy, that all is magically forgiven, because that's going to take time. You stole my past."
Tony looks back at Bucky with the first stirrings of mutual respect. Steve holds his breath.
"But you saved my future." Tony holds out his hand. "That's a debt cancelled in my books, if there even was one to begin with."
"You saved my future."
It's like the storm clouds roll back with those four words. Sunlight blinds them all.
And Steve can breathe.
With shy hesitation Steve hasn't seen in seventy years, Bucky's palm clasps Tony's. Their hands pump once.
The vertigo fades from Steve enough that he darts to be at Bucky's side. "I know you can't forgive me, but I hope you'll at least come to trust me again."
Tony nods, slowly, wary but open. "Second chances, right?"
Peter breaks the heavy moment by wheeling forward and throwing his arms around Tony's waist, gentle with the bandages. Tony huffs, carding his fingers through Peter's hair with an exasperated eye roll.
"Does this mean they're staying?" asks Peter, shaking with joy in his seat. Nat locks his wheelchair so it doesn't jostle.
"If they want to."
"We're still a family!" Peter cries. He laughs and laughs and it sets Clint off too. "Thankyouthankyouthankyou!"
Tony eyes Steve with something cautious but knowing. "We sure are."
With his free hand, he pops open the briefcase. It's got a brand new, shiny metal arm complete with carbon fibre plate joints, lined in foam.
Bruce gasps. "Is that—"
"Vibranium," Tony confirms. "I started designing this before everything went to hell and made a few calls to Wakanda. They were more than willing to cooperate when they heard the full story."
Peter says what Tony apparently can't. He takes Bucky's hand. "It's your family too if you want it."
Bucky's eyes are blown wide, lips pulled back, breath leaving him in shallow puffs.
"Buck?" Steve steps closer. "You okay?"
"No!" Bucky looks imploringly at Tony. "This isn't right. All I've done is take and take. You can't just…give me something like this! Especially not you!"
"Sure I can. I didn't even pay for it." It rolls so easily off Tony's tongue with a very calculated nonchalance that almost seems real.
"It's called grace," says Sam to Bucky quietly. "He's offering you reconciliation, man."
Tony's clearly still shaken, still hurt, yet he looks at Bucky with an earnest expression. "I'll be honest, there's still a part of me that wants to slaughter you where you stand, vengeance. But that's not a real solution. We need to find a better one."
Steve's eyes well up.
"There's always another way," says Tony. "You taught me that. I can't promise this will work…but I'm willing to try."
AN: Tony's choice to try and forgive is a controversial one, I know. But the seedling thought for this whole story was that Peter's presence, how he gets involved and how he's both saved and saves them, would be a balm to the relationship between Tony, Steve, and Bucky once the truth comes out.
