Maybe it isn't that surprising that the guards suspect Bucky immediately, given how they still believe that he blew up the UN, but Steve can't help the fury that rises in his chest at how, despite the fact that he is currently holding Rumlow down, Bucky is still their first target, thanks to the gun in his hand.
Bucky's eyes widen and he stiffens as the guards aim at him, and Steve's ears helpfully inform him of the pickup in pace in his heartbeat. His lips press together at the sound and he watches as a flash of irritation flickers over Bucky's face, his jaw clenching just slightly before he breathes out and slowly raises his free hand.
"Alright," he says quietly, beginning to slowly bend his knees and set down his gun. "Alright, I'm—"
Rumlow strains in Steve's grip, seeming determined to grasp at whatever straws he has left at his disposal. "He went insane," he bursts out, squirming and turning his head to spit angerly at the guards. "He attacked me! Cap's on his side, he—"
"Be silent."
The words drop into the air before Steve can respond to Rumlow's desperate claims, and the two of them dart their heads up to stare at T'Challa, the man holding Rumlow in a smoldering glare, his eyes holding a deep, profound, but careful rage.
He blinks, and the look is stored away, the man now turning to flick his gaze over to the guards and Bucky— the man now frozen, half-crouched, with his gun on the floor. T'Challa takes a step forward, and the flashing red emergency lights glance off the silver of his ring as he turns and plants himself directly in front of Bucky, cutting him off from the line of fire.
For his part, Bucky remains completely still and silent, barely breathing as he crouches, his eyes darting over T'Challa and then to the guards beyond. T'Challa's eyes glance back to him once, before he raises his gaze to stare challengingly at the guards, his regal stance somehow managing to erase the lingering traces of yesterdays bomb and the stress of the last 24-hours.
"This man is innocent and not a threat," he states calmly, before nodding over to Steve and Rumlow. "Captain Rogers has our true culprit."
The guards shift uncertainly, and Steve mentally curses their determination to see the Winter Soldier in Bucky. He adjusts his grip on Rumlow and looks up at the guards, his eyes locking onto the one who had ordered Bucky down. "This is Brock Rumlow," he tells him evenly. "A former Hydra agent and the one who blew up both Nigeria and the UN." His eyes flick to the gun and back to the guard. "That's his gun too."
Which is rather interesting, considering how Bucky hadn't even been let into the building in Vienna, simply because of his arm… but Steve is willing to bet that if Rumlow had been willing to risk this whole venture, then he would have planned around getting a weapon inside.
He wishes that he wasn't so certain that 'inside help' was a part of that plan.
He will deal with that later though, for now the guards seem to at least be willing to take over restraining Rumlow while they radio Ross and re-evaluate the situation. He steps away as they come closer and cuff the man, Rumlow remaining spitting mad during the whole process.
He finds he doesn't feel much as he watches Rumlow get dragged off to get his foot looked at before he gets put somewhere secure for the time being. Rumlow had been a loose end in his hunt for Hydra for the last several years, and he had always wondered what the man had been up to… evidently it had involved falling off the deep end.
His ears pick up the stutter of a breath, and he turns to see Bucky now standing, still half-guarded behind T'Challa. Now that Rumlow and the guards are gone, his face has tightened into thinly veiled stress, and Steve's stomach lurches at the expression, and he takes an immediate step towards him.
Bucky's eyes flick almost desperately to him as he steps around T'Challa, his arms reaching up instinctively to pull his friend towards him. Bucky comes easily, stumbling slightly as he grabs onto him and presses his face into his shoulder, his breaths beginning to become louder as the immediate urgency of the situation begins to wind down.
Steve swallows heavily and clings tighter to Bucky, trying not to think too hard about the subtle trembling in his limbs. He cannot even imagine the amount of stress that he has been in for the last 24-hours, and then to have Rumlow appear and try to trigger him…
He breathes in and blinks his vision clear, focusing down on Bucky. "Are you okay?" he asks roughly, his mind suddenly flashing back to the last time someone had tried to trigger Bucky like this, they had ended up in almost exactly the same position. "I'm so sorry," he says, because there isn't anything else to say. "You shouldn't have had to deal with it, but you did good, you did really good."
Bucky lets out a ragged laugh, his hand coming up to wrap around his arm, his voice muffled in his shoulder as he speaks. "Gotta say, Europe doesn't really seem to like me much," he mumbles, the levity of his comment a thin mask for the magnitude of what had happened to him.
Steve laughs anyways, a sort of half-desperate sound as he and Bucky work on recovering from everything. In his arms, Bucky shifts and pulls back, bringing a hand up to brush away his hair as he flicks his eyes over him. The shaking in his hands is more pronounced now, but his breathing is more even, and he seems to be calming somewhat, riding through the last of his body's physiological response to the day's trauma as he looks at him.
"I'm sorry I scared you," he says quietly, his hand still clasped around his arm. "I saw— you thought the triggering had worked, hadn't you?"
Steve can't hide his wince at that, his stomach squirming unhappily. There isn't anything accusatory in Bucky's gaze, but he doesn't want his friend to think that he hadn't believed that he could fight off the trigger words. "I didn't want to," he says quickly, tightening his grip on Bucky's arms. "I didn't think it would work, and I couldn't understand why it would, since I knew it shouldn't."
Bucky's mouth twitches and he ducks his head into a nod. "Sorry about that," he says. "I wouldn't have done it if you guys hadn't all come into the room, but he had the gun, and I didn't want to escalate it before I knew I could keep him from hurting anyone." He swallows and shrugs, his eyes darting to the side. "I thought that if he thought he had me, he might let his guard down a little."
Steve nods in understanding, breathing in. "Seems like you were right," he says, and Bucky's shoulders seem to relax a little at his response. He shifts, and glass scrapes under his feet as he moves, reminding Steve that they are still standing amid the broken door of Bucky's cell.
"Here," he says, keeping one hand on Bucky as he moves to step away, leading them both back towards the interview table. By now, Tony and T'Challa have both migrated over there, and Steve is glad that the two of them had let him and Bucky have a moment to themselves after everything that had just happened.
Tony offers Bucky a brief crooked smile as he approaches, and his eyes drop down to glance over his metal hand. "How's your arm?" he asks, shoving his hands into his pockets. "It wasn't really designed with 'breaking down cell doors' in mind."
Bucky lets out a soft chuckle and brings his hand up, flexing the metal fingers slightly to show their functionality. "The joints are fine," he tells him. "My shoulder is a bit sore though, if we're ever allowed out of here, you can probably look it over."
Tony huffs and rubs a tired hand over his face. "Yeah, I'm sure the lawyers are going to have fun with this one," he mutters, before he glances over and takes a step to the side, letting out a quiet groan as he leans over to pick up the photostatic nano-mask that Rumlow had discarded earlier.
"You know," he says, his voice holding a dull edge of exhaustion to it as he looks down at the mask, the panels shimmering and flickering in his hands. "I bet this could help explain how Bucky got on that security camera."
Steve blinks, his mouth dropping open in realisation. "Of course," he says, his gaze pinned to the deceptively innocent mask. "All Rumlow would need is a wig, and he'd be set."
His eyes jump over as T'Challa steps forward, silently taking the thin material from Tony, his eyes unreadable as he stares it down. After a moment, he lets out a sigh and hands it back, suddenly looking just as tired as the rest of them as he turns to Bucky.
His eyes dart over him, something deep and tired in his gaze, before he opens his mouth. "Before all this," he starts. "I did not know much of you, or your past history." His eyes slide over Bucky and he gives him a slight nod. "From what I hear from your friends, it makes me glad that you are not the true culprit." He blinks his eyes closed for a moment and opens them again. "I only wish we had not had to go through all this to find out."
Bucky breathes in and shrugs, his gaze flicking over T'Challa for a second. "It's not your fault Rumlow set me up," he says, his eyes darting down to rest on the mask in Tony's hands. He stares at it for a moment before glancing back up at T'Challa. "I'm just sorry your father had to get caught in the crossfire."
T'Challa nods, and Bucky's shoulders slump, his hand lifting up to rub over his face as he lets out a sigh. "I imagine you'll be hearing a lot more of me though," he says, his tone turning dry. "I'm guessing my reputation is shot after all this."
Steve frowns and remembers some of the vitriol that Rumlow had spat at Bucky once he had been restrained. As much as he would like to imagine otherwise, he is guessing that the next little while is not going to be easy for either of them.
Bucky had lived most of the last three years in relative anonymity. But now, within the last week, Ross had come to poke sticks at him, his face and past had been plastered all over the news, and he had been tied to a terrorist attack, which he then had been arrested for.
It is exhausting just thinking of that mess. He doesn't even want to try. He doesn't have to though, not yet, because Bucky turns his gaze back to the nano-mask, his eyes going thoughtful. "So…" he starts slowly. "I'm imagining Rumlow wasn't the guy who was supposed to talk to me…" He glances up at them. "What happened to him?"
Before they can find out, they have to make sure they can leave the bunker with Bucky, without getting shot. Ross finally makes it down to the room, and while he has his own guards with him, he isn't as hostile as Steve had first been expecting. He seems more irate with his own taskforce, rather than suspicious of Bucky.
"You're telling me," he gets out, his eyes narrowed as he stares down one of the guards. "That a former Hydra agent infiltrated us, with a gun, and it took you a full ten minutes before you even tried to apprehend him?"
Steve doesn't envy the guard (although he does find the interrogation rather fitting), and Ross turns away from the stuttered explanations unimpressed, muttering under his breath about department-wide investigations and personnel reviews.
Steve can't help smiling at that. He gets the impression that while some of Ross' actual policies had been edging on problematic, the man himself doesn't actually seem to be allied with Hydra. The man seems to take his job seriously, and is therefore thoroughly peeved at the events of the day.
With Ross more or less on their side (and with Tony's JARVIS-glasses' recording of the situation), it doesn't take long for the man to clear them all to leave the cell. "It's not completely over yet though," he tells them, his eyes glancing between the four of them. "We still have to run everything through the system and drop the charges, so it would be a lot simpler if none of you leave the premise for now."
The request isn't wholly unreasonable, but it is still a little annoying after so long a day, and Steve soon finds himself being led tiredly back up to his office, Bucky in tow this time as Tony calls his lawyers and Ross works on finding out what had happened to the real psychologist.
It feels weird coming back to the empty office after everything that had happened. The chairs are still pushed into makeshift beds, and the desk still has a few leftover wrappers from breakfast, but this morning feels like eons ago now.
"You should stay with us," Tony tells T'Challa, his phone still to his ear as they step inside. "It'll just be easier."
T'Challa follows silently, pulling out his own phone as he moves to sit down. Steve isn't sure exactly who he is calling, but he imagines that there are several people in Wakanda who will want to be informed of today's developments.
Next to him, Bucky sits down tiredly on one of the leather chairs and rubs at his left shoulder. Steve looks over at the motion, scanning him instinctively as he notes the lines of fatigue on his face. The sight reminds him of the kinds of accommodations Bucky had been living in for the last 24-hours, and he leans towards him, his eyes searching his face.
"Did you sleep at all?" he asks, drawing Bucky's gaze to him. "Did they keep you in the cage the whole time?"
Bucky huffs out a breath and lifts his hand to run it over his face. "I slept as well as anyone could, in that thing," he says. "They let me out once for the bathroom."
Steve's lips press together, and he moves to sit down next to him. "Did they feed you?" he asks, his questions a twisted mirror of the ones Jason had asked him this morning.
"Yeah," Bucky says. "I was actually impressed. They gave me enough for my metabolism."
Steve breathes in and relaxes slightly. He supposes it is a bit sad that he feels the need to ask if Bucky had been given food, but with the way people had been acting around him, he wouldn't have been surprised to learn if he hadn't.
He runs a hand through his hair before pulling out his phone, and checking for any messages. The sight of his phone reminds him of his other call this morning, and he turns to Bucky, holding out the device. "You should call your sister," he says. "She's worried about you."
Bucky's eyes widen, and he reaches for the phone immediately. "Ah, geez," he mumbles as he swipes for the number pad. "I can't imagine how this must have been for her and the family."
Steve turns away as Bucky makes the call, wanting to give him a little privacy, and he catches the eye of T'Challa from across the room, the man's gaze resting on them for a moment, before he turns back to his phone, murmuring a few foreign words as he listens. His finger taps on the arm of his chair for a moment, and his eyes flick up to Bucky, his head tilting, before he turns back to his phone.
Steve can only guess what he is talking about, and he is distracted away from the man as Tony lets out a breath and leans back in his own chair, turning off his phone. "Okay, well, the lawyers are here," he says, glancing over at him. "Chelsea's already started talking to Ross. We'll have this sorted out soon."
Steve nods at that. Tony's team of lawyers had been working with them and Pepper ever since SHIELD had fallen, and he trusts that they will be able to sort out the mess between Bucky and the UN – especially now, with the new evidence from Rumlow – but he isn't sure what they will be able to do about Bucky's public image.
Rumlow had pretty thoroughly trashed that, even though Bucky is ultimately innocent.
His thoughts are pulled away from the problem as his phone lets out a chime, the device still in Bucky's hand. He glances over and his friend's brow furls. "Just a second Hannah," he says, before pulling the phone away from his ear and glancing at the screen. His mouth quirks up at the sight and he casts an amused look at Steve before putting the phone back to his ear. "It's lunch time now, apparently," he says, and Steve suddenly remembers the alarm he had set.
"Oh, hey, it is," he hears Tony say, the man glancing at the time on his own phone as Bucky begins to wrap up his conversation with Hannah. Tony looks up at him. "I guess we could try to order something again." He glances over to T'Challa. "Any preferences?"
They end up ordering pizza, because it is an easy way to get enough calories for both him and Bucky, and they wait for it to be scanned through security again before being brought up to them.
"Did you really sleep here?" Bucky asks as he digs into a cheese pizza and scans the room, his eyes glancing off the chairs they had pushed together to form makeshift beds.
Steve huffs out a breath and reaches for a slice of his own pizza. "Yeah," he says, around a mouthful. "We probably could've found a place to stay, but I doubt I would have slept much better anywhere else."
Tony scoffs and shakes his head. "Speak for yourself," he says, his hand coming up to rub at a knot in his back. "You guys might have a fancy serum to help you recover from sleeping rough, but I do not. I'm not as young as I used to be, you know."
Bucky's eyes light up and he grins. "Aw man, Stark. I thought you were the one to put ninety-nine candles on my cake this year."
Steve chokes on a laugh and ducks into his pizza to hide his mumble. "Yeah, and almost burned the whole place down in the process."
Tony seems to take pleasure in looking offended, his hand coming up to rest on his chest. "Oh sure," he says, nodding his head. "Gang up on the guy who bought the food. Good plan." He waves a hand and points at them. "The fact still stands that you two are the youngest ones on base."
More or less, Steve thinks, not bothering to hide his smile this time. Tony isn't wrong. The only person younger than him and Bucky is Spider-man, and Steve has yet to learn exactly how young he really is. Plus, the vigilante isn't a permanent member of the compound, so he doesn't exactly count.
He is distracted from his thoughts on Tony's protegee as T'Challa sets down his slice and glances over at him and Bucky, his gaze thoughtful. "How old are you?" he asks. "Physically."
Steve blinks and purses his lips, his eyes flicking over to Bucky as he thinks. "I guess I haven't thought about that for a while," he says, tilting his head as he does the math. "Think I'm turning thirty-one this year," he says. "Bucky is thirty-two, so that sounds about right."
T'Challa sits up slightly and smiles. "You're almost my age," he says, shifting slightly in his chair. "I'm thirty-five."
Next to him, Tony scoffs, muttering something under his breath about 'the youth'. Steve rolls his eyes at him, before opening his mouth to make a teasing comment about 'back in his day', but he never gets the chance.
An aid taps on the door of their room, ducking her head in as they look up. "Ross wants to see you," she says, her serious tone throwing a damper on the room. "It's about Broussard."
oOo
"We found him in his hotel room," Ross says as they gather around the meeting table, the same one that they had been watching Bucky's interrogation in only hours ago. The power still isn't up yet – according to JARVIS, Rumlow had shorted out the main power for most of the city – but emergency lights cast a sharp glow on the table as they sit.
At least now that Tony's lawyers have stepped in, people seem less inclined to glare suspiciously at Bucky. Ross does glare a little, but not at Bucky, instead his eyes settle on a photograph, his brow furling unhappily as he places it on the table and slides it down for everyone to see.
It is a picture of Broussard, the man's face bloody, his corpse slumped over in the hotel bathtub. Steve presses his lips together and looks away, his eyes glancing over to where Bucky is staring fixatedly at the photo.
"Our guess is Rumlow," Ross continues evenly. "It may be difficult to track, given his nano-mask technology, but we're sweeping the area for evidence now."
Bucky shifts, his eyes never leaving the image. "How many people is that now?" he mumbles, almost to himself. "Over a dozen that Rumlow killed, just to get to me."
Steve leans towards him immediately, prompting him to glance up and meet his eyes. "It isn't your fault," he says firmly, without breaking his gaze. "Rumlow was the one who killed those people, not you."
Bucky lets out a sigh and glances away, his metal hand curling slightly on the table. "Yeah," he says quietly. "I know."
Steve's lips press together, and he leans back, noting T'Challa's gaze on him, the man's eyes flicking to Bucky thoughtfully. For his part, Steve looks down at the photo again and can't help feeling a little extra resentment towards Rumlow for this whole mess.
The man's plan had been desperate, and he had killed a lot of people to do it, and no matter what he says, Steve knows that Bucky will still feel some responsibility for the people who had died.
At least pretty much everyone else doesn't seem inclined to blame him for anything now, and after Ross informs them of Broussard's fate, Tony's lawyer comes in to settle the last of the legal technicalities needed.
Chelsea comes in with a smile and a handshake, a leather folder in her arms and a sharp glint in her eyes. Steve hadn't really had to work with her closely before now, but he can't help being in awe as he watches her work. The woman hasn't had much more than 24-hours to work with – not to mention the fact that the situation had been highly volatile, new evidence coming out just this morning – but she still comes in thoroughly prepared and not at all looking like someone who has spent the last night putting a case together.
T'Challa leaves to give them some privacy as she comes in, but he and Tony stay with Bucky, Ross sitting across from them as Chelsea sits down, her salt-and-pepper hair tucked up neatly around the crown of her head. She glances over them and pointedly sets her folder down in front of her.
"I think it's safe to say that the evidence of Bucky Barnes' innocence is abundant," she starts with a tilt of her chin. She flips open her folder and looks up at Ross. "Even without Mr. Stark's recording of the altercation between Mr. Rumlow and Mr. Barnes, the eyewitnesses to the event, as well as the tampering with the cameras back in Vienna, the murder of Mr. Broussard, and the nano-mask found in Mr. Rumlow's possession clearly exonerate Mr. Barnes."
Ross nods without argument, and Chelsea shifts, turning her eyes to Bucky. "The UN has already agreed to drop the charges against you," she says. "But," she flicks her eyes over him. "That doesn't mean you don't have a case against them."
Steve blinks and Bucky sits up slightly in surprise as he looks at her. Chelsea turns her eyes once from him to Ross, before glancing back at Bucky. "It's up to you," she says, shifting some papers around in her folder. "But the CIA allowed an armed criminal into your cell, placing you in physical danger and undoubtedly causing a mental and emotional toll on you." She holds his gaze. "Not only that, but they released your image and alleged crime to the public, something which will likely have an impact on your life for many years to come."
She shifts her gaze between them all before focusing back on Bucky. "We can pursue this further later," she says. "But I felt you should be aware of the option."
As she finishes, Ross coughs and shifts, his eyes flicking to Bucky. "No matter what you do," he says, seeming to stare more at Bucky's ear than his actual face. "I can pretty much guarantee we will be having our own internal investigation. Too much happened here today not to do one."
Across from him, Bucky breathes in and folds his arms, looking down, his brow furled in thought. The room is silent for a moment as he thinks, and Steve flicks his eyes over Ross, imagining that the man's workload has probably just doubled because of all this.
Even if Bucky doesn't press charges, he gets the impression that Ross will be feeling the effects of this for a long time. A minute passes, and Bucky looks up, his eyes glancing off of Ross for a moment, before he looks over to Chelsea.
"I… think I'm tired of the legal system right now," he says, his shoulders slumping slightly, his hand reaching up to rub at his left shoulder. "And trying to go after the CIA right now will probably bring my Winter Soldier past even further into the public consciousness, so… I don't feel like pressing charges right now."
Chelsea nods, and Steve gives Bucky a small smile of encouragement. While he may agree with Chelsea that the UN and CIA had definitely failed Bucky on several levels, he can't help feeling similarly to Bucky right now. Pressing charges would probably lead to a long, drawn-out, potentially very public trial – and something like that is also very likely to bring Bucky's past with Hydra even further into the light, which they don't want.
Of course, that doesn't mean that the UN and the CIA hadn't raised some red flags, and he casts a glance over at Ross, thinking about the gun that Rumlow had managed to sneak inside. That… is something that will need to be looked into.
He wonders if anyone has done any background checks on the person who runs security lately.
His thoughts are drawn back to the current situation as Chelsea begins to close up her folder again. "That is understandable," she tells Bucky, nodding at him again. "If you ever change your mind, or want to know more, please contact me. The statute of limitations in Germany is a minimum of three years, so we have some time if you change your mind."
Bucky nods and takes in a calming breath, sitting back as Chelsea moves on to clarify some final details with Ross about Bucky's release.
"You should be good now," she says, turning to him. "You might be asked to come to Rumlow's trial, but I imagine that that will take some time. For now, you're free to go."
oOo
In the end, Steve thinks that they are extremely lucky to have Chelsea on their side. He cannot imagine trying to untangle this mess without Tony's lawyers working with them. As it is, they can finally take Bucky out of here and return back to the Avengers.
This still isn't over, not really. But they can at least go home.
"I just left my jacket back in the office," he tells Bucky and Tony as they get ready to leave. "I'll be right back."
The other two nod, and he ducks away, following the – by now – familiar route back to the office Ross had given them. He supposes they were probably lucky that Ross had been willing to accommodate them that far (although his status as an Avenger may have helped with that), but he won't be lying when he admits that he is glad he won't have to be going back there again after today.
There is someone inside when he arrives, and he blinks as he recognises T'Challa, the man standing with his back to him, gazing out of the windows, his phone clutched in his hand.
He turns as Steve enters and gives him a nod, his eyes flicking over him contemplatively. Steve nods back, his eyes glancing from T'Challa to his jacket laying next to his makeshift bed.
"I was just coming back for this," he says, stepping towards it. He reaches for it and then pauses, holding it in his hands as he flicks his gaze over T'Challa. It feels a little strange thinking about him now, thanks to the loss of tension between them, but he can't help feeling for the man.
"We're just heading out," he says, suddenly feeling a little awkward about leaving the man here on his own. "Will you be okay here?"
In front of him, T'Challa's mouth quirks up slightly, and his stance seems to relax as he turns fully towards him. "Yes," he says, lifting his phone. "I have people coming for me." His face flashes with amusement. "As you can imagine, they have opinions about me coming all the way out here."
Steve huffs out a small laugh and looks down. He imagines that the internal politics of Wakanda are probably up in arms right now, not to mention the fact that T'Challa had potentially put himself in danger by following them here.
"I'm glad I caught you before you left though," T'Challa continues, and Steve glances up at him. T'Challa's eyes catch his, and he sets his shoulders. "I have a proposition for you, Captain," he says, tilting his head. "Tell me, how much do you know about my country? About Wakanda?"
Steve blinks, his mouth opening and closing a few times as he thinks. "I'll admit," he says slowly. "I don't know much about Wakanda. Only what the media says."
T'Challa's eyes glint and he smiles, shifting forward. "I see," he says, an undertone of amusement in his voice. "Of course, we both know that the media's coverage is not always entirely accurate."
Steve nods a little uncertainly, his eyes flicking over T'Challa as he tries to figure out where he is going with this. He can easily guess that the man is referring to the media's coverage of Bucky during this whole thing, but what that has to do with Wakanda…
T'Challa breathes in and draws back slightly. "I have had a lot of time to think these last few days," he says quietly, "thanks to the media, and what happened to your friend." Steve nods, and T'Challa continues. "I will admit Captain, that when Barnes was named as the culprit, I was furious." His lips press together and his hand squeezes slightly on his phone. "I believe that if he had not been apprehended so quickly, then I would have hunted him down myself."
Steve swallows and remains silent, his eyes on T'Challa. In front of him, the man breathes in and looks away, his eyes drifting back over to the windows. "Of course," he says quietly. "Little did I know that Barnes was innocent. Just as much of a victim in all of this as my father."
He glances back at Steve and looks down. "Looking back," he says. "It seems obvious to me now." He looks up. "If I had been more willing to see what was in front of me, then perhaps I would not have been so quick to judge your friend."
Steve's throat flexes as he swallows, and he fiddles slightly with the jacket in his hands. "It isn't your fault," he says softly. "Rumlow set Bucky up to take the fall. You saw how they were treating Bucky here, you weren't the only one willing to see him as the Winter Soldier."
The corner of T'Challa's mouth lifts slightly and he shakes his head. "Even so," he continues. "I should have been more willing to search for answers. To ensure I was condemning the right man."
Steve thinks personally that T'Challa had been in the midst of grief, and that he can't blame himself too much for accepting the story given to him. The memory of Peggy's death is still fresh in his mind, and he cannot imagine how difficult the death of T'Challa's father has been for him.
Of course, T'Challa is royalty, so he can understand why the man may feel the need to hold himself to a higher standard.
His gaze flicks to T'Challa as the man breathes in and sets his shoulders. "In the end, we caught the right man," he says. "And he will face justice." His eyes flick over Steve solemnly and he presses his lips together. "But I heard what he said to Barnes. Your friend will still suffer because of this."
Steve winces and looks down at the jacket in his hands. "His identity was revealed to the world in probably the worst way possible," he says, swallowing back a wave of bitterness at Rumlow. He looks up and catches T'Challa's eye. "He told me once that for him, just living a normal life is fighting Hydra, given what they wanted for him…" He trails off and his hands tighten on his jacket. "I guess he was right."
In front of him, T'Challa gives him a sober nod, shifting forward slightly. "That is what I wanted to speak to you about," he says, moving to put his phone in his pocket before looking up to catch his eyes.
He breathes in and sets his shoulders. "Wakanda has remained isolated from the world for decades now," he says, clasping his hands in front of him. "My father said that we will extend our hand forward in peace, and I believe that we must continue to do so." He raises his chin. "I may not be able to help my father anymore, but I can help your friend. If you wish to come to Wakanda – if you need some time away from this storm that Rumlow has created, then our door is open to the two of you."
Steve's eyes widen, and his mouth opens slightly in shock at T'Challa's offer. He doesn't know much about Wakanda, but he does know that outsiders are generally not welcome, and he doubts that he can fully understand the magnitude of T'Challa's offer.
As for the offer itself… he hasn't had a lot of time to think about what he will do now that the Accords are in place, and now that Rumlow has thrown a wrench into Bucky's current life, so leaving... It… is tempting. Dealing with the aftermath of this is going to be a lot of work, and the thought of having somewhere to be outside of the public eye, and relatively away from the Accords… is appealing.
Of course, that would mean leaving the Avengers compound, and it wouldn't mean that all their problems would be solved… but it is something to think about.
"I'll… have to talk to Bucky and the others," he says finally, looking up at T'Challa. "If that is okay?"
T'Challa nods easily. "Of course," he says, stepping forward and taking out his phone again. "I will give you a number to contact me with. If you ever wish to accept my offer, you only need to call." His mouth presses up and he catches his eye. "I think you will find Wakanda… pleasantly surprising."
AN: One more chapter left!
So, thankfully things are moving relatively smoothly with dealing with the aftermath of this. Personally, I don't think Everett Ross is Hydra or even affiliated with Hydra. I think it would be simpler for Rumlow to have gotten a few agents into key positions within the CIA, so that he could sneak in. So, while Ross might have his faults, he is willing to working Steve and the others now that he knows Bucky isn't guilty.
As for Bucky pressing charges, I think it is justifiable, but I don't think he would really want to do that right now. Everyone has already been through so much, trying to sue would be really stressful and bring up the Winter Soldier a lot.
Anyway, now T'Challa has given Steve the offer to come to Wakanda for a while. I think he would do that, since he saw what Rumlow said to Bucky.