There was a stranger in the mirror. The eyes were the same, but that was about all. They made him shave and insisted on giving his long hair a trim, tying his thick locks back with a long blue cord that hung over his empty shoulder. He never paid much attention to his clothes, opting for jeans and a tee shirt or the simple Wakandan style, and now he wore black dress pants and over them an elaborate heavy blue and gold tunic made of an almost armor like leather. A blue sash draped across his other shoulder, infused with Vibranium inscriptions identifying him as a member of the Royal family. He wore another sling across the sealed cover, but instead of the simple red one, this one black and gold tucked and folded out of the way to not call attention to itself. He never wore rings, but now he was wearing a gold circle with a large white stone with the imprint of a Wolf on his index finger. The new polished black boots were uncomfortable.

He turned away from himself to survey the room, still awed by the over the top interior. Marble covered every surface. No one told him the history behind the paintings or the knick-knacks but he assumed everything here was rare and expensive. Every fixture made of gold, every appliance powered by Vibranium, and the Vibranium permeated everything, etched on the walls, in the trim. A large window opened out onto the city from one end of the room, a large marble fireplace dominated the opposite side with a landscape painting above it. The hidden lights came on and dimmed when needed.

He spent most of the time here with a legal team, going over what they expected of him. When he asked about Ward's treatment, they showed him a video of him in his cell and consulting with a lawyer which satisfied him. Today would be the first day of this ordeal. He didn't need to do anything except sit down in a prominent place in the courtroom. A part of him wished they still did things the old-fashioned way, by combat. Even with one arm, he could knock the other guy out and the whole thing would be over.

He mulled over his decision. The legal team were shocked and tried to talk him out of it, but he was adamant. It was his right, and he was going to do it. The normally confident group had left his presence unsure how to proceed but that was not his problem.

This ordeal was turning into an endurance test. He didn't attract noisy cloying crowds, instead, he was treated with rarified deference. I don't deserve all this . I stopped that beam from falling on T'Challa and held it up long enough for everyone to get out. Right place, right time. He had almost forgotten about it at the time until someone released the footage from a security camera and everyone saw it. That one act, plain muscle memory, and instinct on his part became a moment in history and gave him all this.

The door opened, and he expected Luan, the young man who attended to his needs. He turned to find Steve entering the room, dressed in a formal blue Wakandan tunic shirt, not quite as elaborate as his own.

"What are you doing here? They said later this week…" Bucky asked, in shock. He was the last person he expected to see here.

"What do you think I'm doing here?" Steve asked, with that annoying expression he always used when castigating someone for a minor infraction.

Bucky sighed and walked to the window and looked out over the city. "They told you."

"Of course they told me. You can't do this..."

"I can do any damn thing I want," Bucky didn't care that he sounded petulant child.

"Why?"

"Why do you think?"

"Let me guess. Because if you insisted on this foolish idea of yours, it would force them to drop the charge of threatening the life of a member of the Family and the only thing left for them would be to charge him with entering the country without permission and whatever harm he did to the real Chimbuktso. I met him. Seemed like a nice kid, but this guy still locked him up in order to…"

"The fact is, I still killed his mom. He shouldn't have to spend the rest of his life in jail because he wanted to avenge something I did."

"You can't renounce your citizenship…"

"An honorary…"

"It's not to them. This would be a slap in the face of everyone who helped you, who gave you sanctuary, and for what? This guy… Is not worth…"

"I'm not worth it!" Bucky said, the volume of his voice rising. "I do not deserve any of this. Let's let the guy have his day…"

Steve walked across the room and turned him around to face him.

"Don't say that. Don't even think that. You're one of us. One of the team. You're worth…"

"You would say that. It's not like you're emotionally invested or anything."

"Damn it, Buck! Everyone else on the team agrees with me. You didn't need to answer for your so-called sins, but you did. You turned yourself in, you did the right thing, and the tribunal made the right call. You're the one that's always going on about moving on and if you do this, it'll open the door for the Security Council to come in and do what they've always wanted, this is your one protection!"

A knock at the door interrupted his speech. "Yes?" Bucky called out, pulling himself away from Steve's grasp. The door opened and Luan came in, pretending not to notice the two men standing so close together.

"Mr. Stark is here, requesting to speak with you," Luan replied. His announcement took the steam out of their argument.

"Tony? Here?" Bucky asked as if the shock of seeing Steve wasn't enough. "Sure, let him in. What does he want? You're not ganging up on me are you?" He directed his question to Steve, who shrugged his shoulders.

"I have no idea what he's up to," he replied.

Tony entered with his usual flourish, dressed in a Western suit in keeping with his style but still suitable for the occasion. His eyes flitted back and forth from the two of them and around the elaborate room.

"Don't you two clean up nice! And why are you living in that hut instead of here… is that Ming Dynasty?" He put on his glasses to inspect a small blue vase on the table. "No, it's not, but not a reproduction either. How did they do that? And that's where that picture went!" He stared at the landscape painting. "Disappeared during World War II!"

"The Wakandans wouldn't buy stolen art," Steve said." They're pretty sensitive about that, besides, I found out there are some differences between our reality and..."

"An obscure piece, so they might not know. Sad, but it happened," he said, giving the picture the same intense examination as he gave the vase. "No, not the real thing, but close." He removed his glasses and turned to face them. "How DO they do that?" He asked. "And how can I commission them to do it for me?"

"Why are you here, Tony?" Bucky asked.

"I am here, to tell you, as a courtesy that I'm going to have words with David Ward's legal team."

"About what?"

"I am under no obligation to tell you, just the lawyers."

"What are you planning on doing?" Steve asked.

"My small contribution to help the world keep rolling along. It will be perfect painless for all involved, I assure you. All I ask is that you don't go through with this silly nonsense of renouncing your Wakandan citizenship until I talk to them. It will be to your and everyone's advantage. Please, let me try to fix this."

"You, fix this?" Steve asked. "How?"

"I understand my reputation for trying to fix things only to make them worse isn't far from the truth, but this time, things will work. Let me at least try. In the long run, it'll be good for the kid. That's all I ask. If I fail, you can work things out your way."

The tension flowed out of Bucky in small increments.

"Whatever he's planning to do, he's going to do it, anyway. I'm with him. Wait," Steve said.

Bucky walked to the window. The flow of the city was going on around them while they wasted away up here in this tower. He was tired of all this, but Steve was probably right. To throw all this away might be construed as being ungrateful to the country that had harbored him and brought him back to life. "It goes against my better judgment but I'm always getting outvoted. How about a compromise. I'll ask them to drop the charges, but I don't renounce my citizenship."

"Thank you. That's all I ask!" Tony said. He took one long last inventory of the room. "So, do you get to keep this place? If you do, want to rent it out? Be a nice place for a party."

"I don't know," Bucky said.

"Oh, Steve probably told you, but Shuri found time to finish your new arm, all shiny and new, back at the Palace, even has a firewall this time, a little idea of mine..."

"Thank you, Tony," Bucky said.

He started out the door but turned around. "Oh, and they caught those infiltrators by the way. They showed up at the place where you all were camped out. They have them in custody...somewhere. I'll see you in court," He said as he left the room.

A few moments passed before either of them spoke. "Good news about the infiltrators at least, but what is he up to?" Steve asked. "What's left to do?"

"There's one thing we can do," Bucky said. He walked over to painting and gave it a small knock. The painting disappeared, replaced by a screen.

"Ward's defense team," he said. An image appeared of Ward, sitting at a table, with his lawyers. They seemed to be pleading with him but he kept shaking his head.

"We can't hear them," Bucky told Steve. "This isn't the norm. I wanted to keep a check on things."

"And since you always get what you want…" Steve said. Bucky ignored the implied irony of his statement.

"This isn't illegal, but it's pushing the boundaries, just like the rest of my life. How are things back at the palace?" He needed to change the subject.

"Promising. Bruce and the Wakandan science team are close to creating a drug based on the information we brought back. I left them arguing about who got to be the first one to test it. Last I heard, Rhodey is winning. We made Wanda take a break, what she's doing is exhausting and Vision is still in isolation."

"I wish Thor and Wong would wake up, or that Strange would get back. How long does it take to teach magic to a bunch of would-be sorcerers?" Bucky asked, pulling at the restrictive collar of his tunic.

"Looks like Tony showed up."

"What the hell is he doing?" Bucky asked. Tony came into view with a person Bucky recognized as another member of Ward's legal team. He sat down at the table and spoke to Ward, who pushed back his chair and walked around the room but Tony got up and followed him, an arm on his shoulder, speaking to him, guiding him back to the table. After everyone sat back down, Tony starting speaking. The other members of the legal team put down their electronic devices to listen.

"They're going to be at it for a while, whatever this is," Steve said. "Looks intense."

Bucky turned off the screen and watched it disappear behind the painting.

"I'd give you a hug, but I wouldn't want to mess up your outfit. You look good," Steve reached out and touched Bucky's now smooth face.

"So do you," Bucky said. He'd missed this and everything about Steve.

"We will get through this. We've been through a lot worse, you and me. This is a blip."

"We don't even have anyone shooting at us," Bucky said. Steve walked away and examined the room, picking up pieces of valuable brick a brack and examining them. "How have you been, on your own?"

"Sam insisted I stay with him," Steve said.

"Good. I worried about you," Bucky said. "Steve…" he summoned the courage to address their unspoken problem when he opened a small door to the side.

"Steve, wait, don't…" Bucky said.

Too late. Steve's face contorted into confusion, then realization. After a long moment, he let out a long laugh. "Anything you need or want to tell me? You didn't experience some kind of conversion did you?"

"Very funny. No, I didn't and none of that was my idea," Buck crossed the room and joined him inside another even more over the top decorated room. "They gave me these rooms, and it was like this when I came here. I don't know who stayed here last. I couldn't sleep in here, spent the nights on the couch, which confused Luan."

"A round bed? What's are those things along the wall?"

"They're fertility statues. Come on Steve, This place..."

"What's that etched in Vibranium on the mirrors?"

"I don't know, some kind of love poetry. The Wakandans aren't prudes but..."

"They're not hedonists either but this is another world. Look at these curtains. Everything is so… sparkly. So, are these sheets scented?"

"Come on, Steve, they're going to call us soon…" Bucky said. Steve responded by sitting down on the bed and laughing.

"What's so funny?" Bucky asked.

"Just a few days ago, the two of us, out in the woods, hiding from the bad guys, battling bugs and having to cut our own trails, and here we are. Life with you is never boring."

"Well, things changed the moment you showed up," Bucky said, sitting down beside him. The lights instantly dimmed and from somewhere, without prompting, soft jazz music played, causing Bucky to jump back up again. "What the hell…?"

Steve hadn't stopped laughing but now he pulled Bucky toward himself, sealing the experience with a kiss. For a moment in time, it silenced all of his insecurities and fears. The soft lights and music and Steve's touch soothed that gnawing thing inside him. They pulled back, their eyes locked.

"They assumed you'd have company. It's what people do… maybe tonight.." they leaned in for another kiss, the lights dimmed more, but at that moment a knock on the door interrupted them.

"We have to go," Bucky said, standing up. The lights came on and the music stopped.

"Now this will really confuse Luan," Steve said as Bucky took his hand and pulled him back into the other room.