Steve wakes up with a start. He lurches forward, bending at the waist and breathing heavily.

He glances around and sees that his room is empty. But he smiles.

He laughs a breathy sleep filled laugh and he sighs.

He wiggles his toes.

And they wiggle back.

He tries not to cry in relief.

He fails.

—-

Bucky watches as Steve starts to go mad. Ever since regaining sensation and some muscle control in his legs, he's been restless and itching to get out of the bed.

It was hard to stay annoyed at the guy, when he was all sunbeams and smiles. But having to haul him back onto his bed after the 4th attempt of him trying to walk was getting old.

"Steve, I swear on my dead mother's life. You need to stay still."

"Buck." Steve practically whines, "I'm so close, I can feel it!"

"Yeah well I'm losing feeling in my arms from hauling your big head back into your bed."

Steve huffs, "I haven't been outside in weeks."

"I've already offered you a wheelchair."

Steve frowns. "You know I don't wanna—" He cuts off when Bucky just looks at him. "If I'm seen in that… Peter would—"

And it clicks in Bucky's mind. If Steve's seen in a wheelchair, the blame on Spider-Man would come back around, and Peter would feel even worse.

"Fine." Bucky says, "you wanna protect the kids feelings? Fine. But don't torment me by crawling around on the ground."

The pout of Steve's face makes him laugh.

—-

Tony stares at the sample of Steve's blood. He's tried everything his mind can think of to destroy the serum that surrounds each cell.

So far?

Nothing.

He tells Steve this and there's a pause a deep seated pause where Steve stares out the window and his eyes glaze over a bit.

Then he blinks back to life and looks at Tony and smiles.

"That's alright, Tony. I probably would have chickened out and not done it anyways."

They both know that's probably a lie.

Neither comment.

—-

Natasha walks into the room and senses the tension immediately.

She walks over, handing the two super soldiers their cups and sits on the end of Steve's bed.

They smile and thank her and fall silent.

She looks between the two of them, before asking, "did I interrupt? You want me to leave?"

"No." Bucky sighs, "we were just discussing what the future looks like for us."

She grins, "oh, ho, ho, discussing the future…" She waggles her eyebrows at them, "do I hear wedding bells?"

Bucky snorts into his coffee while Steve chokes and starts coughing hard, trying to dislodge the liquid going down the wrong pipe.

"Please." Bucky says with an eye roll, "we'd kill each other before we got to the honeymoon."

"What the hell are we even talking about." Steve wheezes, wiping his face with a napkin. Natasha grins smugly at him and he narrows his eyes. "You like jokin' Romanov?"

"You know I always like to see your cheeks turn that pretty shade of pink when you're embarrassed."

And she feels something uneasy fall over her as Steve, instead of blushing more, just lets a slow devious smile spread across his face. "Embarrassed huh? You ever been embarrassed?"

"Nah." She says haughtily, "Red Room beats that kind of stuff out of you."

Steve nods slowly, and for some reason the gleam in his eyes is one she's never seen before.

"Uh-oh."

She turns to Bucky who's staring at Steve, a surprised and slightly amused expression on his face.

"What?"

"You just challenged a man who has an infinite amount of time and perfect memory recall. You don't know what you've done."

She scoffs, looking at Steve whose face has now shifted into an innocent expression. "What's he gunna do, punch me? Sing me to death?"

Bucky laughs, a true laugh that has Steve grinning from ear to ear like there's a secret joke that she's missed.

"Oh—" Bucky laughs, "Oh my—" He grabs at his chest, "Steve, Steve, you remember when—" He tries to pull in air, red in the face from laughing, "Monty—" He wheezes and leans back, "Monty said the same thing!" He tries to hold in his laughter as he sits up straight and points his nose in the air, then he puts on a terrible British accent, "what's he going to do, Punch me?" He breaks out into another laugh and she looks over at Steve who is watching Bucky with mischievous eyes, and a bright smile.

"He asked for it. Come on." Steve says with an innocent blink of his eyes.

Bucky's finally taking a deep breath and reclining against the side of the chair. "Oh, I can't wait."

Natasha feels a frown on her face, suddenly feeling like she's on the wrong foot, and she doesn't like being out of the loop. "Wait for what?"

"Whatever Steve decides your consequence for challenging him is."

"Bucky." Steve admonishes. "I would never."

Bucky's mouth parts in surprise, and his eyes flit to Natasha's, "oh no, and he's denying it? You're screwed."

She stands up, hands on her hips, "I think I can handle myself thank you."

Bucky just looks at her as if she's a dead man walking and she turns on Steve, jabbing a finger at him, "what?"

"Nothing." He says slowly. But the corner of his mouth is barely, just barely pulled up on one corner and it makes her narrow her eyes at him.

"You're trapped in this bed. You can't do anything."

"Oh—" Bucky chokes, "Natasha seriously? Are you trying to make this worse for yourself? Put down the shovel."

She glares at Bucky. "Shut up."

"The hole is deep enough, don't egg him on more."

"Bucky," Steve says slowly, "I'm fine. I'm not going to do anything. Natasha, don't listen to him, he's just trying to rattle your cages."

The way Steve says that, so sweetly, so earnestly, but with a hint of scolding, all of her senses go on alert and she stares at Steve, "don't you dare."

He looks at her, a mixture of confused innocence on his face. "Don't what?"

"Whatever you're planning. It won't work."

"Natasha, Bucky's just messing with you."

"What did you do to Monty?" She asks suddenly.

"I didn't do anything to Monty." He says suddenly. And that's the moment she realizes what a fool she's been. The lie. So easy. So earnest. He hadn't even blinked or hesitated with the lie. She whips to Bucky, "You were right."

He furrows his brow, "about what?"

"That he's a good liar. Holy hell, I never realized till just now. How many other things has he lied about that I just believed?"

She hears Steve scoff behind her, "I am not a good liar!" But she ignores him.

"You said it, back at the beginning. Right after Detroit, and I just thought your memory was messing with you. But he just lied, straight to my face and if I didn't know any better I would have believed him."

Bucky grins at her and raises his eyebrows almost as a challenge, "it's too late for you now."

She turns to see Steve looking at her, and for all intents and purposes, he's smiling at her softly and looking perfectly innocent.

And she doesn't believe it for a second.

She looks at him, "I'm watching you."

And the smile he gives her, with the blinking eyes makes her blood run cold, "I'm not going anywhere."

Natasha storms out of the room.

—-

Clint feels his phone buzz. He pulls it out of his pocket and sees the Twitter notification.

See Recent Tweets from Those You Follow: CaptainRogers posted something new. See what they have to say!

He smiles. His kids had been over the moon that Captain America had drawn him. His favorite had been Steve's picture of him sitting in the elevator, legs up on the wall, playing 20 questions with FRIDAY. He did that often and Steve had walked in one day. Clint had thought the super soldier would think he was crazy, but instead Steve had just sat down, and joined the game.

So he's excited to see what Steve had posted now.

He clicks the little link and the App opens up.

The words that catch his attention are Avengers: Alter Egos

The Tweet reads:

When not on the clock, the Avengers like to expand their horizons. Here are a few examples of Avengers doing what they love most!

The caption kind of throws Clint off a bit, but he clicks the first picture which is Tony leaning over a guitar and plucking at the strings. Clint nods, Tony did love to pluck around on his Gibson when his brain was too loud and he needed a way to quiet it. Tony loved music.

Bruce's is more of a surprise. There the mild-mannered scientist was, behind a pottery wheel, shaping a vase. Clint could tell it was in Steve's art studio.

He flipped to the next one and was surprised to see his own face, painting mini figurines with one of his kids. Clint appreciated that his kids' back was all you could see, not a single identifying feature. He and Coop had had fun painting the little tin soldiers for Coops' revolutionary war set.

Bucky was there next, half hidden under a car in Stark's garage, his metal arm holding up the front of the car while the other hand holds some sort of tool up into the undercarriage.

Then his hand freezes on his phone, and a choked laugh escapes his mouth, and surprise, and shock and a thousand questions. Because… Because the last one doesn't make sense…

It's a photo of Natasha, at a football game, face painted, screaming and cheering for the team that is playing. Looks like the NY Giants.

Except Natasha hates football.

No. She abhors it. She complains about it all the time. She waxes long about the waste of money and brain cells as men crash into each other.

She hates it.

And Clint knows that Steve knows that. Steve's not a big fan of the sport himself.

So what gives?

He sends the picture to Natasha with a question mark and stuffs his phone back into his pocket, heading towards his car.