Still doing this! :)
#
"He was here and you didn't stop him? How did he look?"
Facing an enraged Captain America, fresh off the plane from where he had been monitoring a political rally in Wyoming, wasn't the most concerning thing on Tony's agenda, but it did make the List of Concerning Things he had for the day. Unlike most people who came to him with complaints, he couldn't blockade Steve at the lobby until he had time to answer the question posed. Instead, Tony spread his hands, shrugged, and plowed into a response.
"Ah, well, I wouldn't put him on with the Kardashians anytime soon, but he looked pretty good. Bruce? Thoughts for Cap?"
"You remember how you looked after the helicarrier?" Bruce asked Steve, having gotten himself as far as physically possible from the conflict by working on something in the back of the laboratory, behind lots of breakable screens. Lucky. "Barnes was that and he's sleeping rough."
"Where was he going when he left you?" Steve asked.
The conversation had gone too long without a Stark, so Tony jumped in again: "Going, dunno, but Hawkeye turned up a lead on a rooftop a couple of days ago. Someone scuffling around, we got some footage and, voila," Tony spun the screen he had been pulling up around so the image faced Cap. "Is this your card?"
The image was grainy and visible in the green-black of night vision goggles, but the thermal imaging showed a warm body with the right arm ending just about the shoulder, the prosthetic replacement visible as just a metal sheen. The body was braced against a wall, thermally-invisible arm drawn against its chest tightly.
"Safe to say he's run out of other options," Tony said. "If he's forgoing even shelters, garages, fire escapes, alleys—"
"Someone could find him and kill him," Steve said immediately. "Hydra would be looking for him there. When are we picking him up?"
"Another point we're not sure on. Hawkeye's trailing him and Nat's keeping tabs on Hawkeye."
"He'll notice—"
"He hasn't yet."
That shut Steve up for a moment, thinking of all the reasons an accomplished and talented assassin wouldn't notice that someone was on his tail. Then, shrugging off the worry: "Give me his last known. I'll get Falcon."
"Last time you saw this guy, he threw you out of a plane."
Steve gestured at the screen, which was rerunning the footage. "Does he look like he could throw me out of a plane now?"
"Why would he seek you out now then? It's been weeks. More than weeks."
"Maybe he remembered something."
"Would he have come after you if he remembered?" Bruce asked. Tony only caught the tail end of it, Bruce was so quiet, but he could extrapolate the rest. The question hit Steve like a brick and then he just… rode it out. Confident as the ocean swallowing a thrown rock.
"Yeah. Buck would come. He'd know that I would want to see him."
"But who knows where he's been," Tony said, flipping the screen to face him again. "Because, heads up Cap, this guy is not safe and not stable."
"You don't know him."
"But I met him. And the last time you met him, he kicked the cap outta you. He might've pulled you out of a river, but he was also on a crashing helicarrier at the time and this guy has been a double-agent longer than Natasha. So just… chill."
Steve pulled the screen around to study the footage again. "On a rooftop."
"Well, yeah, but that was days ago. He could have checked into a hotel by now."
"Negative," Jarvis intoned over the room's invisible speakers. "No one using any of Mr. Barnes' current or former known aliases has checked into a New York-area hotel in the past forty-eight hours."
"Bucky's a sniper. He'll be on a rooftop unless he has a reason to be elsewhere," Steve said with perfect certainty.
"Won't he expect us to think that?" Bruce asked, still even-toned. The conversation hadn't interrupted his workflow at all and, not for the first time, Tony envied his concentration.
Steve shrugged with one shoulder and Tony knew that gesture from making it, under the same circumstances. Fear, uncertainty, and desperately covering both sentiments up.
"He might not remember that I know."
#
Assassin.
Well. Yes and no.
Assassins did their own footwork to find people, so Bucky was an assassin only because he killed. You couldn't expect an assassin to be very capable of research when you stuck him in a freezer whenever he wasn't actively killing and handed him materials to kill the moment he got out and then put him back in when he was done. If he started thinking about that though, he was going to end up never leaving this rooftop and that would be a problem because he had been on this rooftop sixteen hours already.
Contacting Steve, without revealing himself to Banner or Stark or SHIELD, wasn't possible.
He didn't know where the bird man who worked with Steve lived, though he could rectify that. Maybe.
He had stolen a tiny teal phone from one of the apartments below but he knew no numbers to put in it. Any phone without a number was useless; he had simply taken it to have something to do. An excuse to get off the roof.
The police knew who he was, if only by reputation, and wouldn't help him.
The more he thought about the lack of options, the more they crumbled into paranoia. By now, his masters had to know he was here. They knew and their handlers would be here any moment to pick him up, just like last time. Last time.
Last time he had gotten on a train and rode out to Brooklyn and wandered the streets and wasn't sure why until the handlers had shown up dressed as cops and no one could be trusted. Part of him was just waiting for that to happen again.
He had had some success with giving himself orders though. Orders were familiar and could be obeyed without wondering what to do about them. He needed to get off this roof, so he needed to start giving himself orders.
Get up. He got up.
Go to the stairs. He did.
Go to the street. He went.
But then things like decisions started to hit the fan: Left or right? Where are you going? How are you going to get out of this situation?
He almost went back up to the rooftop when he spotted the incongruous large windows and blocky architecture of a shopping mall, just a street or two over. Big, crowded – it would have bathrooms and it would be warm. The idea of being indoors appealed to him: his cough and the late October weather were getting along like pigeons in a submarine.
When the automatic doors slid open, a blast of warm air found its way out and Bucky slipped in, mentally assessing what the orders that got him down here hadn't double-checked. All was in order. The metal arm was covered by the coat. His original glove had been shredded in the helicarrier, so his 'hand' was in his pocket. There wasn't much sensation left in his fingers without the glove – maybe he could pick up another while he was in here. He had a hat that said 'Veterans of Foreign Wars' though and he looked like he'd seen enough action not to be questioned.
Another order echoed, one from way back: Don't stay in one place.
So, he rode the escalator up and walked around the second level until his leg began complaining about the exercise. Fine. He sat down on one of the benches until the order not to stay in one place burned at the back of his brain, then he moved again.
He did this for two hours until he could feel the security guards eyeing him. It rankled. He was master of stealth and he had to wear a hat and limp and he had to keep his metal hand in his pocket to hide it, which was making his arm whirr to try and keep itself cool.
They didn't approach. Good. Let them stare.
"My boy, they are going to arrest you for loitering if you don't buy something or clock in somewhere."
A man had come up next to him – big man with an extremely long and extremely red beard. He looked like a shrink or a professor; no, he looked like the kind of arrogant ass you would have to work for and not assassinate. Bucky was surprised at how fast these thoughts came to mind. Did he dislike people like this? Had he worked with people like this? The man kept pace with him. Reply. Respond. Do something.
"Not illegal to walk," the Winter Soldier said.
"It is a bit illegal to be you, though. The mall cops were concerned enough to contact me."
"Who the hell are you, then?"
"A concerned civilian. I have an informal arrangement with staff here to let me know when a person of your… proclivities visits."
Bucky didn't say anything. The man's voice was subtle, almost familiar, and it had a way of wrapping itself around words. Did he know this man? He would remember him, wouldn't he? This was not a man you forgot. Neither was Steve, but you managed that just fine, didn't you?
"What are you thinking about?" the man asked.
Say nothing. Say nothing. They were walking past stores he had spent the last hour walking past, yet all unfamiliar. Bath and Body Works, GameStop, a cluster of restaurants – he was starving, but as he veered towards this last, the man said quietly that Bucky didn't want to go there right now. Come back and keep walking. He did. Wait. Why did he though? He was hungry, he didn't know this man. He began to panic, even as the man changed the subject.
"Why is your hand in your pocket?"
"…"
"Why don't you take your hand out of your pocket?"
Bucky took his hand out of his pocket. It seemed like the most logical thing to do, like veering away from the food court or allowing this man to keep pace with him. The man looked at the metal hand without surprise, nodded to himself, and Bucky quickly put his hand back in the coat pocket. No one was looking at them, which was strange. They should have attracted some attention; a red-haired giant of a man in a nice suit and a homeless man in a Veterans of Foreign Wars cap, but no one was looking. After a few moments, the man asked to see his gun, inspected it, then handed it back.
"Why are you in this mall?" the man asked.
"%^&* off."
"No reason but warmth and shelter then. You are a rebel without a cause, and I mean rebel in the most liberal use possible. You have already given up searching for Rogers? Tell me."
"%^&* OFF."
"Tell me. It's all right."
"He's… out of state." It was vague but it was all he knew, and the information would be no more valuable to this man than it was to Bucky.
"Ah, the complications of insolvency," the red-haired man sighed and turned away from their stroll, leaning on the edge of the second-level railing to observe the mall below. Too involved to just walk away, Bucky stood awkwardly beside him, right hand still in his pocket, partially leaning on the railing.
"What the hell's that mean?" Bucky asked.
"You can't afford to follow him, so you came to the center of American consumerism. Well, James, there's an easy way of drawing the captain's attention back here. I can help you."
"Why?"
"Shouldn't you be asking 'how'? I thought soldiers took orders."
"Why."
"It suits me. It's a bargain we made quite some time ago."
"I don't remember—"
"Well, you wouldn't. Part of the bargain is that you could remember, at some point. Now, shoot me."
The order had come in a normal tone, no modulation, no quiet urge of will behind the statement, and Bucky took a step back, straightening.
"What? No."
The red-haired man looked at him out of the corner of his eye, gaze almost hidden beneath thick eyebrows and hair. He was Austrian, Bucky guessed now, and tried to pull any other visual cues. He'd never met this man, yet the man knew who he was and had known enough to have mall cops looking out for him.
"Shoot me, James."
"I said no." He was getting louder but the red-haired man only got quieter and quieter, the words stronger.
"Don't turn. One way or another, you are going to shoot me, very publically, right here."
"What the hell - I'm not shooting anyone!"
People were stopping. People were staring at them across the mall's center gap.
"Stay here, James."
He could feel the man trying to urge him to stay in place through simple tone of voice. He had almost reached for his gun when the man said 'shoot me, James,' that was how strong it was… but it wasn't like the machine. It wasn't like anything his masters before had done. It was simpler. It was coercion. Years of having his memory forcibly wiped and diligently reclaimed had made anything not placed there by machine stick out like a thorn in a paw. Coercion was too simple, intended for people who only knew part of themselves. When he was paying attention, Bucky knew every inch of what was actually him and what he decided to do. Namely because it took so long to decide.
The man would have done better with arguing him into staying. He had to stay – not just because the man told him to; he wanted to stay, because this was perplexing and this something new that needed detangling – but he didn't have to shoot the man. Not just because he said so.
"I know what you're doing," he said. The words felt like venturing out onto a sheet of ice. Don't laugh, you'll sound hysterical. "I know what you're doing and it won't work." Nope, laughing. Giddy. "It won't work! What the hell are you?"
"Do you know who I am, James?"
"No. No, but I'm not going to shoot you."
The man didn't straighten from where he was leaning against the siding, looking out at the people who were staring, too afraid to approach and slowly deciding all of this was someone else's problem and nobody seemed to be getting shot.
"You are. It's the only way to truly get your memories back. I told you that once. Consider this a reminder."
Memories? This was new and alarming. Bucky straightened, made sure the hand was still in the pocket.
"I know what was done to you and I can undo it," the man said smoothly. "But first, you need to reconnect with Steve Rogers."
"$%^& you. I'm not shooting you and I'm not leading Steve to you."
"Stay here. Now. Hydra's remnants already know exactly where you are and that you will do what is required. We implanted trigger words in your head for just this kind of moment. "
"Shut up." He had to stay, that was true. But he didn't have to do what he was told. Trigger words. Good God, he hadn't even thought of them but they existed, didn't they. This man knew about them. And look at what he had been programmed to do; what would he do with things they had implanted in him? Screw these orders and this man, he was leaving. Bucky stepped quickly around the man, only to hear him say:
"The fight isn't in you, James. Shoot me."
Everything blurred for a second and the gun was in his hand, the shot still ringing in the acoustically-sensitive mall. People were screaming. The man was on the ground, unmoving.
Had he…?
Oh God.
The Winter Soldier couldn't move for a second, then he holstered the weapon more of habit than decision. That wasn't a Winter Soldier killing, his mind screamed, that was you. You let him tell you to shoot him, what did you do; there are people here. What the hell kind of ghost are you?!
Exit strategy. He lunged over the edge of the railing and landed neatly on some sort of sculptured feature, directly below. Get out of here. Get out. The mall cops didn't have guns but they were running towards him with tasers and frantically calling backup. People were still screaming and, ducking strollers and burly, well-intentioned heroes/mall shoppers, he got out of the mall.
Outside, there was the blur of angry police sirens approaching from the street.
Melt into the background, what is the background; it was still cold out here but the arm was warm again.
Stop. You're not in Winter Soldier gear. They're looking for a man in a hat and a coat and at least one glove. He kept walking, ditching glove and hat and coat, then shoved the metal hand into the pocket of his pants. It wasn't made for that, but the pants hadn't been made for half of the things he'd done in them.
Holy hell, you just killed someone again and you're walking away. What would the man on the bridge think? He'd think this is you, this is you; this was always you.
The police passed him by in the scree of panicked people. He kept walking north until he hit the City's midtown area and could see Stark Tower pitched up against the sky. Time to turn around and head south again, until he hit the water. Neither trip took very long, or helped him figure out what to do next. Walking just made the limp worse and the arm began whirring and whining with the exertion. He had been too long on the ground, so he scaled one of the apartment buildings and found it occupied, so he climbed down again. This area had more homeless people and fewer secure areas, though it was well-lit by the splendor that was Stark Tower.
That was really how he thought of it. Splendor. Manhattan was disturbingly complex, but Stark Tower always glowed. The Statue of Liberty hadn't changed in any way he could notice. Everything up here was a sight because he didn't have the pressure of seeing it through the lenses of a mission, or with an eye on the time.
Televisions blared in the window of one of the stores and Bucky paused to look up at it. It was a report on the bird man – the Falcon, Sam Wilson – advertising him as the most eligible bachelor in Harlem. Harlem. Harlem was… not terribly far from here.
###
...yup. Did a lot of Google Mapping to figure that one out, having never been to NYC and having only a middling knowledge of Marvel placement/geography. Annnd sorry bout the Faustus.
