I didn't get to update earlier today cuz I had classes from 9-2 then I had to pack to go home for the easter weekend. And as soon as I got home my friends and I went to see Captain America 2 again. GOOD NEWS: I'll be home till Sunday with very little homework and lots of time to update. I've got the next few chapters written, too, cuz I kinda got carried away….

Review and let me know your thoughts, questions, concerns, whatever! Predict what you think is gonna happen in this fic ;)

Chapter 6

The minute Tony walked into the room with a small box in his hand, the Winter Soldier remembered him. Clara knew it by the small, almost imperceptible twitch of his lips.

"Kinda hard to forget that one," she muttered. Clara grinned when the corner of his mouth turned up for half a second in a genuine smirk.

"Alright, Bucksicle—"

"What?" His eyebrows pulled together in confusion at the poorly developed nickname.

"Well, Cap is 'Capsicle,' figured—" Tony tried to explain, but stopped when he saw the unappreciative look he was getting from a few of the others in the room. "No nicknames then. Whatever, I brought the EMP."

"Great." Bruce took it from Tony. "What's the range?"

"Not far, pretty close range. It was the prototype for the suit—why?" Tony muttered, glancing up at the Winter Soldier as Bruce inspected the handheld device.

"This should short circuit the chips in your head until we can have them removed," Bruce explained. "Ready?" He waited for a firm confirmation before he pressed the button. The lights above them flickered for a second, but more noticeably, the soldier's metal arm fell limply to his side.

The weight of it just hanging off his shoulder unnerved him. It was heavier than his other arm by a few pounds. His eyes flicked up to Clara, who was watching him carefully, and then to Bruce, who had discarded the EMP on a nearby table.

"Something failed," the Winter Soldier stated, trying to move the arm at his side.

"No, it did what it was supposed to," Tony said, a condescending hint in his voice that pressed a button in the Winter Soldier.

"I know how an EMP works," he explained, letting a bit of anger tinge his voice. "What I mean is that my arm has certain capabilities. The sensory array in it keeps it from setting off metal detectors, but it can also emit an EMP of its own—meaning it shouldn't be affected by one."

"Okay, so you shorted out." He smiled and shook his head, throwing his arms out. "I can fix that. Robotics has kinda been my thing."

"Clara called you Iron Man," he realized.

"I thought you didn't remember coming here," she murmured to him.

"It's coming back to me," he muttered back.

"Well, while Tony is fixing your arm, I'll show you everything Tony has on you, see if we can't jog your memory a bit," she told him, flitting around the room, collecting different things.

"You should have an easier time remembering things now." Bruce took off his glasses and ran a hand over his face. "No more little cognitive hiccups when you sleep."

"It's never happened before. I never slept. I was always cryogenically frozen between missions." The room paused to stare at him for a second in surprise.

"Alright, well, follow me down to my garage in the basement and I'll rewire your arm for you," Tony said awkwardly after a second, offering up a smile before he spun on his heels and led them out of the room.

XXX

"Alright, so I'm not sure how much of this you remember from when we got here—" Clara began once they were down in the lower levels of Avenger's Tower. He was seated in a modified medical chair, not unlike the one he'd had his shock treatments in. But the lack of electrical apparatus surrounding him put him at ease enough to sit still.

Clara began pulling up the files Tony had shown them about the Winter Soldier. His flesh hand shot out and pulled the top of the laptop down a bit before he saw too many of the articles on his murderous missions.

"I remember that part," he grumbled. "I don't need to see it again."

She gave him a supportive smile and gently brushed his hand away before opening the laptop back up and closing the files. "Okay, how about we explore Bucky, then?" She typed his full name into a search engine and he contained his surprise at how many related pages came up.

"Oh yeah, there's that exhibit at the Smithsonian in DC," she told him, clicking the link at the top of the page that took them to information about the exhibit. She glanced at him. "We can go some time, if you want."

"I've been," he muttered, distracted by the pictures of the exhibit on the page. "While you were out before we flew here. Didn't jog my memory much."

"Stories don't bring back memories as strongly as familiar places, people, scents, sounds—those sorts of things." She hesitated, jaw working to find the words to voice her next thought. "Are you sure you don't want to speak to Steve?"

"Yes," he said tightly. But his eyebrows had pulled together, the saddest look on his face. "Not right now. I can't. Not after everything I've done."

"None of that will matter to Steve," Tony chuckled fondly, straddling a stool on the other side of him and pulling on work gloves. "He's the kind of guy that sees the best in everyone."

"Don't I know it," he whispered to himself, remembering the vague memories he had of Steve.

"Alright, Big Guy." Tony motioned for him to put his arm on the armrest, which he had to manually lift it off his lap and place it there with his other hand. Tony tested its weight, picking up and dropping his wrist himself. "Damn—that's not light. Alright. Let's see what we're working with."

"Hold on," Bucky muttered, reaching around himself to the bottom of his shoulder when the metal met the flesh of his back. "There's a loose panel—I can't—"

"Got it," Tony grunted, pulling at the panel that the soldier's fingertips could barely reach. He pursed his lips when all of the panels on his arm shifted up and flipped open. Tony's eyes lit up at the sight and his lips pursed. "JARVIS, tell Pepper I won't be home tonight."

"Very well, Sir," the AI chirped.

"I've seen this technology before," Tony laughed. "It's Russian in origin. I used the same base tech in my suits—but this is like—the iPhone 5 to my iPhone 2." Tony was practically panting, afraid to even touch it.

"Are you gonna fix it or make out with it?" Clara asked, eyebrows raised.

Tony blinked at her. "Not sure yet, give me a minute."

"Okay, then," Clara said slowly, turning back to her laptop. "Before that gets pornographic, let's go back to googling you."

"Googling? I don't understand," he muttered.

"You understand how an EMP generator works, technology that's only been around since, like, the 50s I think—but google baffles you?" Tony chuckled.

"I was taught what I needed to know—weapons and different kinds of tech I was stealing. Stuff I either had to work with or had to be able to recognize," he explained, voice flat, emotionless, and uncaring. "I can't tell you when I learned all of it, but I know it. I knew about laptops and the touch screen you have up in your office—though, the screen-less imaging is new."

"Google is a search engine on the internet," Clara explained patiently. "You type a word or phrase in and it finds pages related to that. 'Googling' is just a slang verb for doing a google search."

"And with that—this shouldn't hurt, but the metal might heat up," Tony said. "Let me know if it bothers you."

The Winter Soldier watched as Tony leaned over and stuck his tools into one of the opening, tweezers pulling at wires, strengthening connections. Sparks flew, flickering against the shiny metal. It felt exactly like it did every time he got upgrades. When the red-haired woman threw the small electric disruptor at his arm—it might not have worked, but it weakened a connection. And then Steve had tried to break the arm with his shield.

A finger twitched as Tony managed a reconnection. "See!" he grinned. "Same base tech."

"Hey, you had a sister?"

The soldier turned back to the brunette woman at his side and looked at her screen. "Those are medical records."

"Hers—her name was listed on your obituary from the 40s. She died about ten years ago." She looked up at him and knew he was remembering something. He was looking at the laptop screen but he wasn't seeing it.

"C'mere," Bucky grunted, hoisting a small girl up onto his hip.

"Bucky I wanna go, too," she said.

"Sorry, Rebecca, you're not old enough," Steve told her, flicking one of her curls.

She stared at Bucky sadly. He pressed his lips together. "How about I take you to Coney Island sometime instead," he suggested softly, knowing the six year old was going to cry soon. She nodded finally, knowing he would not be taking her dancing with him and Steve.

"Promise?" she asked softly.

"Promise." He kissed her forehead and she pulled his face to hers, kissing his cheek before pushing him away and jumping out of his arms.

"Alright, Big Guy," Tony muttered, pushing his chair away a bit. "See if you can move your hand."

The Winter Soldier blinked and balled his hand into a fist, hearing all the parts move as they should. He reached back on his own and snapped the lever back into place. All of the plates shifted down in a ripple.

"How does it feel?" Clara asked, closing the laptop.

He stood and took a few steps away from the chair before swinging his arm in a circle, whipping it into place. "Perfect," he muttered in Russian. What the mechanic that was assigned to him always said after he was fixed up or upgraded.

"Is that good?"

The Winter Soldier turned around and offered a quick, fleeting smile. "Yes. Thank you." Clara could see his flesh hand beginning to tremor and he shook it to keep it from shaking, shifting his weight nervously from one foot to the other. "Why are you doing this?"

"Because you asked me to fix your arm," Tony responded, cleaning up his tools.

"Not just fixing my arm—everything," he breathed. He pointed menacingly at Clara. "You saw all the people in that hospital—there because I attacked SHIELD." His gesture moved to Tony, who had halted his movements and was watching him now. "You—I could have killed you parents for all either of us know. And yet you fix up my arm, you and the other doctor are helping me—why?"

Clara stood up, lips pressed into a line. "Hey, I've worked for SHIELD, I've seen and heard people who have done some pretty messed up things," Clara pressed. "No one is beyond help—that's why I became a doctor."

"Why don't you say my name?" he snapped at her.

"Because you haven't told me what you're name is—"

"You saw my file. You know my name."

Clara wet her lips and let out a short breath, reminding herself that this was just another moment he was having. "I know—but you haven't told me what you want to be called."

"I don't know because I don't know who I am," he shouted.

"Okay!" Tony yelled above them. "This has really escalated quickly and it's late. Why don't you guys go take a shower and go to bed?" He paused. "Not together, though I do suppose it'd take the edge off a few things."

Clara rolled her eyes and turned back to the Winter Soldier. "Why don't we go get you a shower and some place to sleep?" He didn't respond, his chest heaving. "You can decide what to do in the morning, but I don't think you've gotten any sleep in days. I'm surprised you're still standing." His face softened but he still didn't move. "I promise you, it's medically proven that sleep can help memory function."

She could almost see his resolve breaking in his eyes. Taking that chance, she grabbed his metal arm and pushed him towards the door. "Shower and a couple of rooms?" she asked Tony.

"Back up to the fifty-sixth floor. When you get off the elevator, turn right, first hall, last two doors on your left should have spare beds. You'll pass locker rooms on your right," Tony directed, going back to cleaning up his things.

"Thank you, Tony," Clara said earnestly. "Even though—"

Tony shook his head. "Don't worry about it."