Full disclosure: I read imaginebucky prompts on tumblr. I am not trying to steal or emulate/imitate anything written there, but stuff that I read gets in my head. The tumblr is not affecting the plot, motivations, or interactions of the characters, but I know that there may be some ideas between here and there and wanted to acknowledge. : )

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Steve kept talking about Namor as JARVIS directed them down to living quarters, which perplexed Bucky beyond anything else. A tower should not accommodate residential living. He didn't have much time to think about it because Steve kept talking.

Namor – otherwise known as the Sub-Mariner and a prince of Atlantis, and an arrogant jerk while he was a good man to have at your back. But that wasn't the only person Bucky had forgotten – there was The Human Torch, Steve said – a man they had worked with several times who could ignite himself without burning to death or experiencing pain. Steve named them, others, the entire group of the Howling Commandos and Bucky recalled a handful. That was… sort of good. At least he hadn't killed them.

He lost track of where they were going, trying to keep up with Steve's dialogue, and only stopped when JARVIS directed them to a closed door.

"These will be your quarters, Mr. Barnes, for the period of your stay at Stark Tower. You will have noticed you passed through several fortified doors, but I have been instructed to remind you of it. These doors will be locked."

That took no explanation. "So I can't leave."

"For the time being." The door ahead of them clicked as a bolt slid out of place. "Enter."

Steve glanced at him, then pushed the door open and they stepped into the largest bedroom Bucky had ever been assigned. It wasn't the largest he had ever seen—several missions had required that he enter bigger, more lavish bedrooms, but it was the biggest he had ever had to himself. The bed was in the main room and it took only a glance to know he wouldn't be sleeping in it tonight. Or ever.

"Clothes have been ordered and should be waiting by the time you finish showering," JARVIS said.

And there was a shower, bigger than the ones he had been slipping in and out of the YMCA to use and this one was private. Steve made a concerned noise as Bucky stood in the bathroom doorway, looking in.

He didn't look back at Steve. Looking was going to mean that he understood why the noise was made, when the questions were already running around his head. Can you take a shower, what if you slip and fall, what if you forget where you are and demolish the glass door, what if you forget about JARVIS and try to beat the speaker to death with the showerhead?

Instead he channeled Steve's Bucky and said the most arrogant thing he could think of: "I'm a master assassin, I think I can shower without…"

—what was it called when people fell like that? He knew what it looked like, like round-housing the sky, like kicking at a football and missing–

"…banana-peeling on the floor."

"Banana-peeling?"

"Go away. The sky-voice told me to take a shower." It wasn't hard to channel Steve's Bucky, but it was tiring and hard to know how much was too much. He must not have overstepped his bounds, because Steve held up his hands in surrender and backed out.

"If you need anything, yell for JARVIS."

"I won't."

"But yell—"

"Goodbye Steve."

Thank God, he left.

"Start the shower, J….ARVIS. JARVIS," Bucky said.

"You have to do that, sir," said the speaker, with a touch of smugness. This didn't seem right. Machines shouldn't be able to be smug, but Bucky let it go and, with a bit of figuring, managed to turn on the shower and adjust the temperature.

"Is the room bugged?"

"I monitor the room, sir. There are no other devices."

"And you report to Stark?" He sat down on the toilet seat to wait for the shower to heat up. The light overhead had switched over to heat-lamp the moment the shower came on and he was comfortable, even waiting for the shower.

"Stark insists that I report what you are 'up to,' however, he is not interested in 'sneezes and farts,' JARVIS said.

"Are you telling him you're talking to me?"

"Not at present, sir. He is meeting with Ms. Hill."

"Good." A part of the Winter Soldier pulled out in front then – he didn't have to be Steve's Bucky with this robot, he could start completing the mission. "What was Dr…"

No. The name. The name. The name was the mission. He sat in silence, trying to remember it.

"JARVIS."

"Sir."

"What was the name of the doctor we talked about in Stark's office?"

"Dr. Johann Fennhoff, otherwise known as Dr. Faustus."

"What's his last known address? It should be…" think. Think. "Ches.. Chesapeake."

"I'm sorry, sir."

Ah. So there were some provisions in place. Bucky let it go for the moment and got in the shower, grateful for… everything a shower was. Baths were like the tank. They weren't, he knew that logically, but there was that similarity to being in cyro, surrounded by water slowly growing cold. Showers were hot and ever-changing; you didn't fall asleep in a shower. The arm was waterproof but he had known that so long it felt silly to consciously think it. Of course his arm was waterproof. The whole Winter Soldier project was a massive waste of time if he could be shorted out by a dunk in the ocean.

"I know he lived in New York," Bucky said, over the sound of the water. "Give me his movements before that."

JARVIS apparently had no instructions on that, so the speaker went into a rundown of the psychiatrist's movements for the past decade. Bucky could figure out, knowing the association with Zola, what some of the movements were regarding. Nothing stood out, no bolt holes that he could remember, so he tried to remember everything the man had said leading up to the… trigger. In the background, he could hear his arm starting to get mad at the heat of the shower and the steam, whirring viciously, cutting out, then whirring again. Let it. His lungs didn't mind the heat and the wet – this was the longest he had gone without coughing in weeks. Months?

No, focus, you were thinking about Faustus. Faustus.

"Sir?"

Bucky flinched to life at the inquiry. Someone pounded on the door, saying his name loudly, but the yelling person hadn't said his name. His skin felt wrinkled and dehydrated from the heat, his arm just a hissing, sad thing by his side. Steve was the one yelling.

"Copy…. JARVIS," he said.

"You have been standing in the shower for half an hour, sir, since you stopped responding."

"Bucky!" from outside the door.

"—And Mr. Rogers grew concerned."

"I'm fine, Cap."

He didn't say it loud enough—the man kept pounding. Easier to step out of the shower, go over to the door, and reassure the man than to yell. He moved to open the door and the arm let out a long, whistling whine, refusing to respond.

Fine. It had done this before; he opened the door with his other hand and stepped out. He quickly realized he only had the dirty clothes he had stepped in with. Putting them back on was pointless. There was the towel but— what would Steve's Bucky do?

"Steve, I need my damn clothes."

The pounding stopped. It had been a polite pounding. If Steve wanted IN, he would have just smashed the hell out of Stark's door and apologized later.

"You're okay?" Cap asked, voice muffled by the door.

"Clothes."

A pair of jeans and a cotton shirt were tossed in. Bucky had become used to jeans, a 1950s-era invention, but it was still weird to have them be the first thing anyone thought of for him to wear. Wasn't the point that he wasn't going to run around doing heavy-duty things? Except for – ah, right. The ongoing hunt for… the man he had killed. Whatever his name was.

"JARVIS," he began, intending to ask the computer about the red-haired man's affiliations.

"Bucky."

He stopped in mid-stoop to pick up the shirt. "…what happened to 'sir'."

"My authorizations have been upgraded. Master Stark advised me that the best way to get your attention was to call you Bucky."

"Don't." He tried to pick up the shirt. His arm didn't move. "Stick to sir. Or soldier. Or…" He couldn't think of more words. "Not Bucky. Don't."

"Of course, sir."

Damn it, his arm wouldn't move. He concentrated on making his fingers move, realizing after a moment that he was sitting on the floor now, staring at his hand. Dead. The metal gleamed in the heat lamps of the bathroom, as much a part of him as a rock was part of a waterfall. Dead.

"Buck?" Steve said.

Get your damn pants on, soldier. Struggling, he managed to follow the internally-given order, even managing to button them. The shirt… shirts, who needs shirts, I'm the Winter Soldier.

And a memory of Faustus emerged: Really, Mr. Barnes, the only thing that has ever made you useful and worthwhile has been the winter soldier. The only time you were called upon and regarded as anything other than merely human.

So he had met Faustus before.

"Buck, seriously, are you okay?" Steve asked from the other side of the door. Damn it. Get up. He got up, pushed open the door and, intending to stride past Steve, almost fell onto the super soldier instead. Steve gripped him by the shoulders and stabilized him easily. If he noticed the dead arm, he didn't show it.

"Didn't you get a shirt?"

So he hadn't noticed. Bucky glanced over at the wall.

"Arm's dead. Stark should charge it."

"You want to take it off?" Steve asked, carefully.

"No."

"I'll help you get a shirt on then and we can—"

"No."

The tone held more venom than either of them had expected and Bucky tried to backtrack.

"Don't want… don't want anyone dressing me." Eye contact was far too daunting a proposition, even if it was what Steve's Bucky would have done. "You get it?"

"I do. You in the mood for a meal, first?"

"No." Bucky stabilized himself against the doorway and shrugged, suppressing a cough. The change in air temperature was already doing a number on his lungs. "Just want to see the iron man."

Steve seemed frustrated. "You need to eat."

"And you need sleep. Don't see you slowing down."

"...come on. We'll find Stark."

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No, seriously, this is going somewhere, eventually. Hopefully, the journey there is entertaining.

Reviews are appreciated, though I'll probably keep updating until we get where we're going, regardless.