So, I'm not even going to try making an excuse for my absence. I got into other fandoms, fell off the bandwagon, and have been working on original projects rather than fanfic. That's about it. But here I am with something new!

This isn't anything special. It feels like filler to me, despite that it covers the entire Winter Soldier movie. But it's some kind of update and I'm still struggling, so I hope that the effort is appreciated.

Many, many thanks to Stelra Etnae, Cyanide Peppermint, jayley, love toshiro dragon,Zenoneel-Sarior, richbecky213, jeanette9a, Princess Hinata Bug, BookWormmy, and a Guest for your lovely reviews! Not to mention your patience and continued love for this. It's one of the many reasons I want to finally finish this. The other one is that my husband (as of December) has been getting on me about finishing one project before starting another.

Disclaimer: I don't own anything under copyright.


Chapter 15: Mister Lonely

"Ever has it been that love knows not its own depth until the hour of separation."

Kahlil Gibran

The confrontation went down in Avengers history, if for no other reason than that no one knew exactly what happened. They all had their ideas, mostly accurate, but they all knew better than to ask.

Instead everyone went their own ways for the moment. The universal threats were giving them a break, so it was time to take a vacation while they could. Or at least most of the team. Bruce went to Hawaii for a week to relax, and then the Pacific Islands to continue his medical work. Thor happily sped off to New Mexico to spend some time with his beloved. Barton went somewhere in Upstate New York but no one really got any answers about what he was doing.

Steve never asked what Tony was up to, but when he asked JARVIS if the other man was alright, he was told that Malibu was treating him well. If the AI seemed sadder, and colder, than before, Steve didn't say anything. "Thanks, JARVIS. Keep looking after him," he said with a sad little smile.

"Of course, Captain," JARVIS told him, "Care for yourself as well. Despite your disagreement, Sir would be upset if anything happened to you." The thought was heartwarming.

Despite that, Steve couldn't bring himself to hope. "I'll be fine. SHIELD's got me," he said instead.

"I suspect that's one of the things that Sir worries about," JARVIS replied dryly.

It made Steve smile, one of the first things that had recently. "If he wants to know, or if you or Pepper need anything, I'll be in DC," he told the AI, "Bye, JARVIS." It was the last call he had with anyone associated with Tony, for months.

He didn't even know about the Mandarin targeting Tony until after it happened; he was stuck in the middle of nowhere, Siberia for the whole month it was going on. Afterward Steve left a very angry voicemail with JARVIS. He never got a call back.

There was training with SHIELD, finding new places to people watch and new people to meet, and the occasional mission with Natasha. She was the only one he had seen since they all left the tower. They went to bars and big events together when one looked interesting. When she saw his, to him, perfectly normal apartment she even dragged him to the biggest furniture store he had ever seen and picked out his housewares.

It was a little awkward to have to explain that no, they weren't that kind of together. And no, they weren't roommates. She was just his interfering coworker who breaks into his house and eats his food. A blank look and even more awkward quiet came after that.

The anniversary of the 107th being captured came around in October and for the first time, Steve felt okay to go to the memorial. He wasn't on a mission somewhere, or saving the world from robotic octopi or whatever this week's threat was. It was time.

Except that when he got there, several barricades had been put up saying that all national parks were closed. The signs were a big old kick in the balls, a denial that felt personal despite that it resulted from a government closure. Which in itself felt ridiculous, but Steve wasn't about to get into that one when he saw an opportunity.

While guards that weren't there yesterday were distracted, a crowd of wheelchair bound veterans and their companions were pushing at the barricades. Technically it was against the rules but it was the right thing to do. Luckily for Steve, that was his specialty.

He darted through the swarm of wheelchairs and past suited people talking to guards. At the metal fencing, he partially lifted one side of one and turned it parallel like a gate opening. Another barricade was turned by a few people to add more space.

There was a loud, hoarse cheer, and the veterans flooded in. They were wheeled to the walls of bas relief carvings, looking at the central fountain, touching the pillar that represented the state they came from. The quiet awe and pride sent a warm feeling through Steve's chest. Whenever his guts clenched at the images portrayed on the walls, he looked at everyone around him and smiled, allowed their feelings to permeate his own.

Upon reaching the pillar that represented the soldiers from New York, Steve couldn't help laying a hand on it. The stone was cool and smooth despite the sun. He knew it was his imagination, but he could feel the presence of the others who came from his home, smiles and wiseass jokes and claps to the back.

He could almost hear Bucky laugh and hear the whirring of the arc reactor.

With a shake of his head, Steve straightened up from where he had bowed his head. A last little pat to the stone had him release it.

"Um, excuse me, sir?" a girl asked him. She stared up at him with big blue eyes, made even bigger by her glasses, smiling nervously.

"What can I do for you?" Steve replied. He fully expected to be told that only the veterans were allowed in here right now and be asked to leave.

Instead, the girl requested haltingly, "I saw you, you know, leaning there, and, sorry, but it was such a perfect shot, I had to take a picture. So, um, do you mind if I keep it, or do you want me to delete it or something?" She looked like she expected to be told off at any minute. A thumb hovered over a few dots in the corner of her screen as she showed him the picture.

It was a good photo, Steve had to agree on that much. The sun bounced off his hair pleasingly and painted the back of his leather jacket an almost matching warm gold. His face was hidden by a thick arm. A strong figure, bowed before a pillar of stone with the weight of the world on his shoulders. There was emotion in that image and he found himself entranced by it. "Can I get a copy?" he asked instead.

Amazed, the girl nodded furiously. "What's your number? I'll send it in a text," she offered.

They walked away a few minutes later after an agreement for her to delete the message from her phone, but keep the picture. It wasn't like anyone but those he knew best would be able to recognize him from it anyways.

That done, Steve wandered to the plaque and the wall of stars. From there he went to the fountain, and then the wall representing the Pacific. The scenes of getting exams and taking their oaths of service and then burying the dead, or fighting, brought back memories despite that it was a different theater.

Then he saw the homecoming scene and froze. His mind went back decades, to plans of buying that old building and being the fun uncles to Howard's and Peggy's kids and getting old together. More images followed.

Tony and Bucky, laughing and allowing the dames to kiss them in thanks the moment they were off the gangplank in New York Harbor. Getting a two bedroom apartment with a view of the sea, and Tony rebuilding every appliance in the apartment while Steve drew and Bucky handed him tools. Standing beside Bucky at his wedding a few years later, watching him glow like a beacon as the preacher pronounced that he could kiss the bride. Children and anniversaries and eventually dancing together in public when they were finally allowed to even though their joints were stiff with age and hard wear by then. Never having to live without the people he loved the most.

Except that never happened. Even though he could practically see Bucky eating a damn ham sandwich, and feel Tony's hand in his, it was all a figment of his imagination. And it never could happen.

Before anyone could approach him, Steve hurried out the Atlantic arch.

He didn't go back to the memorial that year.

Instead he visited Peggy in the nursing home, did missions with Natasha, and had to learn how to function on his own in this modern world. It was harder than people made it look. Not just because of all the new technology and inventions, but because everything changed so fast.

It was no surprise that depression and anxiety were such common problems today, Steve thought with a grimace as he looked in the paper one day. There were articles about campus shooters and rape in the military right next to each other. The numbers were staggering for both of them.

But despite how he did it with gritted teeth and more hours at work than strictly necessary, he did it.

Then the Lumerian Star happened.

Everything went downhill after that.


Tony tried everything he could think of. He redecorated Steve's room (no, the guest room, dammit) and rearranged the furniture and even tried taking down the paintings from Christmas and the auction. Not a single damn thing he did helped.

He still wasn't anywhere near over the world's first superhero.

If pissed him off like nothing else had this side of Coulson's near death experience. Admittedly that may have been part of what caused his challenge to the Mandarin and everything associated; he needed to vent his anger at someone, and his friends weren't having it. Though they didn't like him making himself a target and nearly dying either.

Probably the worst part of it was that when Steve left him a voicemail afterward, Tony couldn't stop himself from listening to it. Anger came through loud and clear. Then he realized it was worry he heard in the pauses and stuttering, and hung up like the phone burned him.

So Tony tinkered. He ignored Pepper's attempts to reason with him, and Rhodey's eventual interference, and JARVIS's weekly reports on the team's well being. All he could do was invent and improve and pray to a god he didn't believe in that he'd get over the Star Spangled Man With a Plan.

Destroying the Iron Man suits was a mistake. One Tony dearly regretted and he began rebuilding immediately, no matter what he had promised Pepper afterward. His rescinding that did nothing to help the tension that had plagued them since he came back to California and wouldn't say why, but he kept himself too busy to feel guilty.

He also tried to not think about how he blurted out that he loved Steve. Tony had berated himself over and over for it, the stupidity of not just letting his heart be burrowed into but admitting it right then. It was the worst possible time he could have said anything.

Just thinking that he would have done nearly anything Steve asked, and done it happily, made Tony grind his teeth together. Before the Incident, there had even been a suit he did make for Steve. The most precious gift he had ever given anyone.

And now here he was, all that effort and feeling and hope dumped into a black hole. It felt like he was getting sucked into a black hole.

Around the end of March, 2013 Tony decided that his normal projects weren't keeping him busy enough and it was time to start digging through the SHIELD files he'd gotten after the aliens in Manhattan thing. He was still able to have nightmares about Barnes pulling the arc reactor from his chest and Steve smiling. There wasn't a single thought about actually dealing with it; Tony wasn't very good at that. Instead he ignored his problems and kept working and started looking through those files.

Some of what he'd gathered up was more interesting than other bits. The Budapest file was more enlightening than Tony would ever admit to and he set it aside to examine further when he was through the entire pile of information. Folder by folder, he worked his way through mission reports and operations parameters and even the fucking budget the whole way back to what they had digitized of the late 1940's.

By the first of April, Tony was faced with a choice between the two folders left. The old SSR files from World War II, including the Howling Commandos files, or a mysterious one with a nonsense name that according to JARVIS had been on an ultra-secure, very well hidden sub-server. In an effort to avoid the emotions that would come with the SSR files, he opened the other.

Files from Operation Paperclip regarding only former HYDRA, those of more recent operatives, and even modern day ones. Including every single STRIKE team member that Tony had ever seen. It would have looked like ordinary personnel profiles, except that other sub-folders provided awful context.

There were more missions and schematics and science, but nothing that SHIELD would ever have approved on their worst days. Everything in here was brutal. There was even an entire system for organizing all the assassinations, generally on public figures that were considered peaceful and powerful.

The more Tony read, the more horrified he became. It shouldn't have been nearly so much of a surprise as it was to realize what he was looking at. These weren't SHIELD files.

They were HYDRA.

Blinking, Tony had to take a moment to reconcile what he knew with what he was seeing. All his life he had known that when Cap went into the ice, he had done it to bring down HYDRA's last threat to the world. In front of him was evidence that evil had not only endured but infiltrated the very organization that had been made to fight it.

"Sir, there is something that you may wish to see." JARVIS interrupted his stunned disbelief.

"Go ahead, Jay," Tony ordered. He shook his head and tried to pull his head back into the game.

A report flashed on a separate screen. It was Nick Fury's profile, highly redacted and complete with a picture of him glaring at the camera. Across the page was a red stamp: DECEASED.

The breath left Tony's lungs in a rush. While he and Fury didn't have the best relationship, he recognized that the other man was possibly the best director SHIELD had been blessed with since Aunt Peggy retired. "Show me the report," he ordered.

It was a mess. An assault earlier that day was mentioned, but not in detail, and Tony had his AI dig into that while he read the rest. The description was short: he had been sitting in Steve Rogers's apartment in DC when somebody shot him through a damn wall. Only Steve's and an Agent Sharon Carter's testimonies made it more than a page long. Somebody didn't want this to be looked into.

When Tony looked at the previous attack, he found what looked like a routine cop chase. Except that cops didn't carry automatic weapons or attack SHIELD's armored vehicles. They gave a good try, but there was no way they'd get Fury, he was too good-

A figure with some kind of large gun waded into the center of the street, but the camera catching this part of the chase faced his back. There was an explosion under the SUV and he stepped aside right in time to avoid being crushed by the overturned vehicle. Smoke poured out but he was unfazed as he walked calmly forward.

"Holy shit," Tony let out when he saw the man rip off the SUV door. After that an unmarked black van hustled him away, and that was it.

Combined with the HYDRA files he just saw, he was sure he knew what was happening. This was evil rearing its ugly head again after decades of being buried. And there was no one he knew he could trust that could be found or contacted. Thor was on Asgard, Bruce was in Bumfuck Nowhere, Clint was impossible to reach, and Natasha and Steve were off the grid.

That Steve was involved in this was suspicious in itself, combined with the knowledge of a cover up from way back when. But his file hadn't been included in the HYDRA folder, so…

There was a last sub-folder to dig through, labeled Zimniy Soldat. When translated, it read Winter Soldier. It was Tony's last hope to not find Steve in here, and that made opening it more difficult.

Thankfully there was no Captain America. Instead he got weird shit about cryo-freeze, a mechanical arm, and mind wiping. Then a list of assassinations spanning from when he got these files the whole way back to 1950. There were over two hundred successful ones, and two unsuccessful: Howard Stark in 1956 and Peggy Carter in 1961.

According to the report it had been pure luck that his dad ducked down for a bottle of beer at the right time. The idea that if things had gone any other way, Tony wouldn't exist was unsettling.

Then he read fully through the list of successful kills, and felt his blood pressure drop dangerously. Near the middle of the list were his parents. Their deaths hadn't been an accident like he had believed for nearly thirty years and he didn't know what to do with that information.

So he went to the next page on the file and was faced with a picture that made him gag. It had no gore or anything else that would normally cause that reaction. No, it was the person in the picture that made him nearly lose his coffee, which was taken through a viewing slot in what must have been the cryo-freeze chamber.

James Barnes. The man whose face he had seen over and over in his nightmares. The Winter Soldier.

It made a startling amount of sense, Tony thought vaguely as he read through some medical charts. The guy was an expert marksman and already highly effective, of course HYDRA would want to recruit him. But the presence of mind-wiping and cryo-freeze in the dossier made him feel uneasy. That wasn't something done to dedicated, willing agents.

"Another alert, sir," JARVIS called out.

This time Tony's jaw dropped. It was from SHIELD, detailing Captain America as a fugitive. His face was all over the internet and tv with a special hotline for anyone who sees him, saying that he was suspected to be involved with the death of Nick Fury.

That more than anything amped up Tony's need to sort out this whole HYDRA-SHIELD mess. If Cap had anything to do with that, he'd drink one of Dummy's concoctions. "JARVIS, when's the new suit going to be ready?" he barked, standing up to pace. He was restless with the need to do something but there was nothing he could do without the suit.

Except maybe dump the HYDRA file on the internet, but he'd have to think on that option a little more carefully.

"It will be approximately four more days before the Mk 43 is ready for testing, sir," JARVIS reported apologetically.

Tony swore colorfully. That wasn't nearly as soon as he needed. "Are there any little things we can cut out to speed that up? Don't need the spinning rims," he said, trying to remember everything he'd put in.

"Nothing that would not require more time to calibrate for its absence," JARVIS answered. It was the exact opposite of what Tony wanted to hear.

When he collapsed into his chair, he cradled his head in his hands. Dammit, why had he destroyed his suits?! Of course he would need them right when he didn't have them.

Then Tony went through the list of things he did have, and he smiled. He couldn't do anything to help Steve on the ground, and he didn't have anyone to give the information to that could do anything with it. But he did have his brains and the perfect target to use them on.

The few times anyone called the number to report sightings of Steve, or Natasha, Tony noted without surprise, the data was hijacked and the data muddled by JARVIS. Social media was exploding with support for Captain America and doubt that he could have done such a thing, and he stirred it up with his own doubts and hints. There were speeches trying to justify the manhunt and others demanding an open investigation into the manhunt. It was chaos.

Luckily, Tony worked well with chaos. He took glee in muddling the waters as best he could, using every tool in his arsenal to provide doubt in Steve and Natasha's favor. And if that included throwing in a mention of HYDRA every now and then, well who could blame him?

For two days that went on, even after Steve, Natasha and some guy identified as Sam Wilson were captured at gunpoint. Thank Thor for news choppers, Tony found himself thinking as one of the STRIKE team members lowered another's gun after a glance up at one. It was the only reason they lived long enough to escape from custody again.

After that fight the pictures of Barnes's face and his assault of Captain America went viral. It was an opportunity to stir things up even more, and Tony spilled some of the information he had about mind-wiping onto Tumblr, various blogs, and a Wiki. Chaos could only help Steve at the moment and that was what the goal was.

Whenever Tony passed out or went for more coffee, JARVIS took over. Otherwise he was emailing, Tweeting, and otherwise getting in touch with everyone he knew about what was going on. To be thorough he sent copies of the HYDRA files to Pepper, Rhodey, and Happy, and deleted any trace of sending them. Just in case somebody tried to erase the evidence he had. Not that there was a snowball's chance in hell of anyone getting past JARVIS, but this way there would also be other people with access in case something mysteriously happened to him. With HYDRA showing their hand like this and him being such a pain in their asses, nothing was guaranteed.

Others helped too. Once it came out that Steve, Natasha, and Wilson escaped, there were calls in placing them anywhere from New Mexico to Greenland. Of course some more accurate ones leaked through; it would be suspicious if the one place they were wasn't mentioned at least once. They were buried by all the false sightings, though. Between that and all the support being put up on the internet and some tv channels, there was no confusion about where the American people stood.

All the while Tony battled with his own emotions about the whole mess. Barnes killed his parents, killed his Mom, but those files clearly indicated that there was some doubt whether he could be blamed. Steve was being accused of something that he clearly didn't do, and yet sometimes there was no forgetting that he was a trained stealth operative who had seen and done some real shit. He did betrayal well enough. Together they had pretty much made sure that a murdered man was forgotten about, but the full story wasn't there.

And the damn diary, the one that held all the answers to that last question, was still in New York.

Maybe those old SSR files would have something…

Tony was half way through the Project Rebirth folder when a call came in from a cell phone on the edge of DC. Hope and dread knotted in his gut as he answered. "And what can I do for you?" He tried for his usual slick snark, but he wasn't feeling it.

"Hey, Tony. I take it you've heard the news?" Steve asked quietly.

"They've probably heard it on Asgard by now." Tony snorted. "Of course I have. Who do you think has been muddling up your trail?" He started pacing again, unable to have this conversation while still.

There was a moment of stunned silence. "Thanks, I didn't expect that," Steve said.

"Hey, you may have betrayed me and all that, but what are personal issues in the face of ultimate evil, right?" Tony asked faux-lightly.

"Tony…" Steve's voice was pained now.

"No, don't get into that. Why are you calling me anyways? You're trying to hide, and this isn't the best way of doing it," Tony interrupted. He knew that Steve wasn't so great with technology's finer points yet, but Natasha should have at least warned him about this. Why wasn't she wrestling the phone away?

"This isn't the best way, but it's the only chance I'm ever going to get to say that I love you too," Steve told him, voice heavy.

Tony stood frozen, unable to do anything but listen. Those words were some that he had never thought he'd heard. That he'd wanted to hear his whole life, from this man's lips. This was the worst time imaginable for it.

The last words Steve said were, "I always have, so much that it hurts. I'm sorry for this. Goodbye, Tony." He hung up without giving a chance to reply.

For nearly three minutes, Tony stared at nothing. The words he had heard repeated themselves over and over in his brain, and despite that part of him was dancing with joy, a cold shiver went down his back.

I'm sorry for this. Goodbye, Tony.

"Oh hell no," Tony muttered, eyes widening, "JARVIS, where was that phone call from exactly?" He watched with horror as the map of the US was narrowed in more and more until it was focused on the Triskelion. Oh no, this was bad. This was very, very bad.

JARVIS switched to a live feed unasked. Three helicarriers emerged from under the Potomac, that Tony had helped build, and he cursed himself for it now. Without meaning to he had helped the enemy.

Then what could only be called a battle started and Tony watched with fascination. Red, white, and blue were easy to pick out on the deck of one carrier while another failed to deal with a guy with mechanical wings. There was no other support that he could see, and he wondered where Natasha was. She was still alive and fighting, right? Awe and appreciation filled Tony even as he was washed over with guilt, watching the men jump and fly from one carrier to another. They were pursued by planes, attacked by guards, and eventually even engaged by what could only be Barnes. No, not Barnes, the Winter Soldier. Barnes didn't exist anymore.

Arguably the worst part was that all Tony could do nothing but feel for a stool, sit down, and watch. He didn't have a suit and couldn't get to DC in time to make a difference even if he did.

All three helicarriers went down and Tony felt vicious satisfaction. Take that, HYDRA.

JARVIS chose to inform him then that even more information was being dumped on the internet than what he had. It was coming straight from SHIELD headquarters. Natasha, Tony thought with relief, and started collecting copies of everything.

Later that day he was told that Steve was in the hospital. He'd been beaten shot, stabbed, beaten unconscious, and nearly drowned. There was only one person who could have done that to the world's first superhero.

Despite his issues, Tony was still as hopelessly in love with Steve as ever. And that news was unbearable to hear. "JARVIS, start tracking the Winter Soldier," he ordered coolly and began tracing over maps of the area with his own eyes.

It wasn't a good idea. It was a very bad idea, in fact. But there was no way in hell that Tony was going to let the Winter Soldier get away with what he'd done.