The Winter Soldier didn't sleep. He sat on the sofa, staring into the darkness for a long time, and when he finally went to his room, he couldn't fall asleep as well. He lay in the dark and stared up at the ceiling, feeling equal parts anxious and confused. Eventually, he grabbed the papers Alex had printed and quietly left the house, sitting on the porch and flipping through them. They didn't make any sense but it felt like a compulsion; he couldn't stop rifling through them. On one page near the end, he found a blurry black-and-white photo of him that he had missed earlier. It was him…but his hair was short, his eyes were closed, and he looked thin and gaunt. Deep shadows ringed his eyes and he lay on some sort metal gurney, though the photo was so blurry that it was hard to tell. One arm hung slightly off the gurney and the other… It felt like the Winter Soldier's stomach had dropped. The other arm was missing. It looked like there were messy stitches and gashes near the shoulder where there had once been an arm, but there was clearly dried and crusted blood all around the area where the limb had been ripped—or taken—off. Either HYDRA hadn't known how to properly clean a wound in those days or they hadn't done it yet. The Winter Soldier obviously knew he'd once had an arm that had been taken off…but it was a different beast to see himself without it and without the cybernetic arm as well.

His eyes were opening and he felt awful, like an army tank had run him over several times. His mouth felt cottony and sharp, stabbing pains were shooting up his shoulder. He blinked and then blearily lifted both hands.

A flash of silver. He blinked again, confused, and then gaped at the hand that was somehow extending from his body…but was silver and not human-looking. This wasn't his arm—what the hell was this? Where was HIS arm?

Panic threatened to overwhelm him as he struggled to get up from the metal surface he was tied down too, hysterical and unintelligible sounds escaping his mouth, and then someone was rushing over… In his terror and rage, he lashed out at them, grabbing them by the neck. Get away, his mind was screaming, don't touch me! His grip on the man's throat tightened almost without even realizing it—controlling this arm felt so foreign—

And then all of a sudden men in white coats were swarming around him and someone stabbed a needle into his neck. His vision immediately began to fade and his limbs went limp and heavy, as if they were bags of wet cement. He blinked, a little bit of drool coming out of his mouth, and then he saw an ugly little face sitting by him, saying something…about… "Marvelous experiment…"

And then he was gone.

"SHIT!" The word burst from his mouth before he could control himself. The pain that had come with this memory— He clutched his head and leaned back, groaning. He couldn't even take regular human medication for this. Something as mundane as Tylenol wouldn't work on his system. He would need to take at least four 1000 mg pills of Tylenol and Ari probably wouldn't let him do that.

He covered his hands with his face and sat there on the porch for the rest of the night, trying to clear his mind. Around four a.m., he heard noises from inside the house and knew Ari was moving around. Apparently she couldn't sleep either. He went back inside an hour later just as she was lugging two black duffel bags that looked extremely heavy into the kitchen. She was sweating and she was wearing skinny jeans, an oversized black sweater, and black Converse sneakers. Her long hair was being pushed back by a thin black velvet headband.

"What are you doing?" he asked.

"Packing," she said. "We can't go on a trip without packing. We need things."

"Like…?"

"Like food," she said. "Medicine. Emergency kits. Some of my equipment. My laptop. Electronics. Clothes."

Speaking of which, he needed to remind Ari to buy him some clothes in some colors other than black.

"Why are you up so early?"

"Because we're leaving early," said Ari. "I want to get a head start—and I have a quick errand to run, too. Do you mind?"

"No."

"Okay," she said. "Eat breakfast while I take the bags to the car." She pointed to the fridge and then dragged the bags out of the house.

The Winter Soldier decided to indulge in the modern delicacy of Trix cereal. He'd always been fed bland food back at HYDRA, food that had been specifically engineered with the maximum amount of carbs, nutrients, electrolytes, and other chemicals he needed to be stronger, faster, better than all the rest. But they'd never cared about making the food taste good. After so many decades of their food he hadn't even realized food could taste good, but Ari had changed that. He also ate a lot more than she'd expected, so she'd started making food in double the quantity. As it was, he inhaled three bowls of cereal and then rinsed his bowl and put it away. It wasn't something he would have done before but he was changing slightly.

Ari had been wandering in and out of the house, taking random things to the car, and when she saw that he was done, she asked him a few questions about his health—"How do you feel? Any dizziness, aches, pains? Any changes in movement?"—and then she clapped her hands and said, "Let's get the show on the road!" Her eyes were a little shiny and she looked a little too excited for someone who was going on a strange road trip with an assassin at five in the morning. He wondered why she was so happy.

He got into the passenger seat of her car and they pulled off, the sky just beginning to lighten and turn the palest lavender. Her house lights were on. She didn't want it to seem like no one was home "because burglars" had been her reasoning.

He expected her to pull onto the highway that she'd brought him from—since that was the direction Washington D.C. was in—but she headed in the opposite direction, driving through the community and into the small town. All the shops were closed but he saw a few stray early-morning joggers passing by, their hoods drawn over their heads. "Where are you going?" he asked.

"I just have one quick thing to do," she said and she didn't elaborate any further. She pulled up to a large white building which said RIVERSIDE HOPSITAL and parked in a parking lot that was labeled "Employee Access Only."

"Wait here," she said, getting out of the car and grabbing her purse and keys. "Don't wander off this time," she added, but he suspected she was teasing because her tone was lighthearted. She ran off into the hospital and he watched her go. All of her movements seemed quick and flighty, like a hummingbird, but they were also very calm and assured. She didn't seem to hesitate when it came to doing anything.

He looked around him. The parking lot was mostly empty but the occasional car would drive up and park and people would straighten their clothes and hurry towards the building, holding bags and lunch bags and purses and thermoses of coffee. The morning staff was arriving. He also saw a few bleary, exhausted people—mostly women—ambling to their cars, also clutching Styrofoam cups of coffee, and driving off. The hospital had had lights on in the parking lot but as the sky increasingly lightened, the orange parking lot lights clicked off. They were on an automated timer. No one even glanced at him in the car; he suspected most people were too tired to notice him, and it was also too dark to really notice him.

After twenty minutes, Ari came back out. She was smiling but it didn't reach her eyes and he could real the anxiety and some other emotion on her face—sadness?—but he didn't question it. He wasn't comfortable discussing feelings with people, especially not other peoples' feelings. What if they poured their heart out? How would he respond? He could barely empathize with people yet and he was terrible at conveying any sincere form of sympathy or emotion. He still cringed somewhat when he remembered his response to Ari's emotional story about Alex: "That sucks."

"What did you do in there?" he asked.

"You don't have to worry about it," she said.

This irritated him. She was treating him like a child and she didn't have to. He had a right to know. He was tired of her hiding information from him. He grabbed her arm roughly and asked, "What did you do inside there?"

Ari turned slowly to face him and raised an eyebrow. "If you were trying to intimidate me by grabbing me, it didn't work. Please let go of my arm. I want to help you, Soldier, but what I did inside has nothing to do with you and I have a right to my own privacy. If we want to work to get your memories back and find out who you were, you're going to have to behave appropriately. And grabbing people is not appropriate."

The Winter Soldier felt like he had been slapped. His face burned slightly and he let go of her and muttered, "Sorry…"

"It's fine," she said easily. "You have instincts and temperamental problems due to your confusion and the fact that you were an assassin…I get that. Just try to take a deep breath and count to five silently in your head the next time you feel the urge to do something irrational." And with those wise words, she swung out of the parking lot and headed back through town towards the highway.

She let him know that the drive was a couple of hours so he should make himself comfortable. He didn't know how to do that, however, so he sat there stiffly, unsure of how to behave or how to act. Even in Ari's house he had been able to escape to his room to avoid spending too much time face-to-face with her. And they weren't face-to-face here but they were definitely side-by-side. Were they supposed to talk? Should he say something to her? What was there even to say? A part of him wanted to thank her for doing this but he couldn't make himself say it, he didn't know why.

Luckily for him, Ari seemed comfortable in the silence and she eventually turned the radio on, asking him if it was okay. He didn't care so she turned up her music loudly and rolled down the windows as the sun climbed higher in the sky, the wind blowing her hair back from her face. When the sun shone in her face, she slipped a pair of aviators onto her face and sang along with her music with no self-consciousness. She wasn't amazing, but she wasn't too horrible either. At the very least the Winter Soldier didn't want to rip his own ears off. If someone had driven past them and simply looked at Ari, she would have looked like a happy and carefree young woman going on a joyride. But that was only if they disregarded the surly-looking man in all black with long messy hair and shadows under his eyes sitting next to her, awkwardly looking anywhere but Ari.

But she wasn't as happy as she was letting on, was she? The Winter Soldier stole glances at her, observing her and noticed that her hands seemed to tremble every now and then and she also shook her head once or twice, as if trying to clear her head of troublesome thoughts. Her smile faltered once or twice but it happened in the blink of an eye and next second she seemed fine again. She wasn't so unlike him, in some ways, he realized to himself. She knew just as well as he did how to put on a poker face and he didn't doubt that someone less observant than him (and with less amazing eyesight) would never have noticed that she wasn't extremely happy.

"We were young and drinking in the park,

There was nowhere else to go.

And you said you always had my back,

Oh, but how were we to know…

That these are the days that bind you together, forever.

And these little things that define you, forever.

All this bad blood here, won't you let it dry?

It's been cold for years, won't you let it lie?"

The Winter Soldier's skin felt a bit prickly as he took in the lyrics of the song Ari was singing under her breath too. He knew the song had nothing to do with him…but it had been cold for years, hadn't it? So many years of never-ending cold. So many years of being frozen in sleep, so many years of waking up with ice crystals on his hair and eyelashes and faces, so many years of being the Winter Soldier. So many years of never feeling like he had fully thawed out, so many years of feeling like a block of ice inside. And there had been blood, quite a lot of it spilled mercilessly over the years…

He took a shuddering breath and quietly asked, "Can you turn the song off?"

Ari looked at him and her expression immediately changed to alarm. She turned the song off and pulled over to an overpass right away. "Are you okay?" she demanded. She leaned closer and he leaned back, alarmed. "You're white—and you're sweating. What's wrong? Was it a memory?"

"Not…not exactly," he said. "That song…it just reminded me of my life."

"Your life as…Bucky Barnes?" she asked.

"No. My life as the Winter Soldier."

"Oh." She hesitated and then said, "Want to talk about it?"

He was about to say no right away, like he always did—why would he want to talk about it? What would talking about anything accomplish?—but when he opened his mouth, the words came out like uncontrollable word vomit. "I…I just remembered being cold. I was always cold. Physically, I was…they locked my in the ice a lot. And they thought I was asleep, and in a way, I was…but I could still feel it. I was still aware I was in the ice. I wasn't dead…I was sort of asleep…but I could feel the ice pressing in on me, feel it in my throat. And when I woke up…I did things." He looked her dead in the eye and raised his cybernetic hand, showing her. "I killed people. I spilled blood. I was cold inside too. I still am…" He trailed off. "I don't know. Why does it matter, finding out who James—James Buchanan Barnes was?" He stumbled over the name. "I can't go back to being whoever he was. I've done stuff. I've seen things."

"Haven't we all?" Ari asked quietly. "I'm not…I'm not saying that what I've seen is worse than what you saw or did. But there are people who see and do worse, Soldier. There are humans who live in war-torn countries and live through genocides. Who see everyone they love murdered. And there are people who do bad, horrible things…and change. I know. I've worked with them. I've had patients who were criminals, who had done things that disgusted me inside. But I put on a brave face and I helped them and…some of them went on to become great people. Some of them didn't, of course. But the choice lays with you. You get to decide who to be from now on. You used to be James Buchanan Barnes. And then you were the Winter Soldier, against your will. This time you get to choose. You can be all of one or none of any or you can be a mix of the two—or you can be someone totally new. And you can't ever forget that you were forced to do these things," she added. "It doesn't justify the people you killed—but it also means that you're not one hundred percent to blame. You're not a cold-blooded murderer. If you were, you wouldn't be having these feelings."

"What feelings?" he asked, afraid of the answer.

"It's called remorse, Soldier," she said.

They sat there in silence for a moment, not speaking. Suddenly the sound of police sirens wailed up behind them and the Winter Soldier stiffened, feeling a bit of panic. Ari looked at him and hissed, "Stay calm! Stop fidgeting! Actually—look at this like you're texting!" She tossed him her iPhone and he stared intently at the screen, unaware of what he was looking at (which happened to be Ari's Instagram page.

A cop strolled up to Ari's window and she rolled it down and smiled sweetly. "Hello, Officer."

"Hi, miss…is there a problem here?" the officer asked, peering into the car. His gaze fell on the Winter Soldier and the Winter Soldier furiously moved his thumbs the way he had seen Ari text. He tried to compose his face into one that looked deeply interested in whatever was on his screen. A drop of sweat trickled down the back of his neck. Would this police officer somehow recognize him? The Winter Soldier didn't know if law enforcement had been given a photo of him, to watch out for him. He should have cut his hair. He should have worn a hat. He should have—

"Oh, no, we just stopped to make a phone call," said Ari. "Can't talk and drive, you know!"

The officer nodded absentmindedly, still staring at the Winter Soldier who was pointedly ignoring him. The officer himself wasn't a threat—the Winter Soldier could have taken him out in three seconds—but the Winter Soldier also knew that not only would Ari never let him do that, killing a police officer on the side of a busy highway would almost surely blow his cover. And where there was one cop, there were always five more close behind. He was just worried that the police officer would somehow recognize him from the mess in D.C.

But the cop shrugged and said, "Okay. Keep moving, please," and ambled back to his car.

Ari let out a relieved sigh, rolled up her window, and merged back into traffic. She turned her music back on but more quietly this time and it didn't trigger any strange feelings in the Winter Soldier. They drove in silence for a few hours and stopped a rest-stop/gas station to use the bathroom. Ari handed the Winter Soldier one of her hair ties in case he didn't want to attract any attention and she bought a blue baseball cap and an oversized light gray sweatshirt for him. "To make you fit in more," she told him. "I guess the all-black wasn't smart…though I still think you look cool in it. You look badass."

"Uh…thanks," he said.

They headed off again and she didn't turn the music on this time. It was early afternoon, around lunch time, but he wasn't hungry, so she didn't stop anywhere to eat. He'd been up all night and the smooth feeling of the car on the highway and the hum of the engine soon…made…his eyelids…fall shut…

"Soldier." Someone shook his shoulder gently and he shot upright, eyes flying open. He rubbed his eyes and looked around. They were parked outside a large white building. He looked around to see Ari looking at him. "Where are we?" he asked.

"Washington D.C.," she said. "You fell asleep for the rest of the journey. You looked really tired, so I didn't wake you to eat even though I stopped somewhere. Sorry. But you can eat now."

He looked at the building, feeling a bit confused. Seeing his expression, she clarified, "We're at a hotel. We won't actually be meeting Captain America till tomorrow. So we needed somewhere to stay."

"Why tomorrow?" asked the Winter Soldier. He sat up, pushing his hair out of his face and then he frowned, a sudden question hitting him. "Wait…how will we meet…Captain America? How do you…?"

Ari suddenly blushed. "Well…I sort of did my research."

The Winter Soldier waited.

"I couldn't sleep last night—or, this morning, I guess it was," she said. "So I thought, Wait, how are we going to even find Captain America? So I started digging around on the Internet and I dug…well, pretty deep. And I found all this stalker-ish websites created by fangirls who sort of document public sightings of him. And apparently he goes jogging every morning around the Washington Monument. But he goes at, like, five a.m. So we'll have to go meet him tomorrow."

The Winter Soldier stared at her.

"What?" she asked defensively. "I didn't know how else to find him! I could have asked Alex to track him down—but after how I threw him out yesterday, Alex would have refused. Plus, I'm not sure I want Alex knowing we're going to meet Captain America. Alex is really greedy; he'd probably force us to let him tag along."

The Winter Soldier felt a headache coming on and rubbed his temples. Meeting Captain America tomorrow…well, he'd known it had to happen eventually. He still didn't feel ready to look into the face of the person who had apparently been his closest friend…especially after he'd beat the living daylights out of him and tried to kill him several times…but he had nothing to wait for. At least he still had the rest of the day to prepare himself mentally. And Ari would be with him. The thought reassured him for some strange reason.

His stomach rumbled and he said, "I'm hungry," so they got out of the car and Ari said, "I'd take you out to eat…but considering you sort of destroyed a part of D.C. only a few weeks ago, I think it's best if we stay out of sight. Let me go check in and get the keys to our rooms and then we'll sneak you in, alright?"

He leaned against the car, crossing his arms and pulling his cap down and waiting. Two teenage girls nearby got out of a Mercedes convertible and looked at him curiously and he avoided their gaze, staring determinedly at his feet. He hoped they'd walk away soon but he kept sensing they were staring—and then they started giggling and whispering to each other. He suddenly felt extremely antsy and he looked at them for a moment. They had been staring but they immediately turned away when he looked up and he could hear them whispering even more furiously. He looked back down, alarmed now, and was extremely relieved when Ari came back a few minutes later.

He pointed to the girls and hissed, "I think they recognize me. They keep staring at me and whispering. What do we do?"

Ari looked at the girls for a moment—and then she burst out laughing. The girls looked over at the sound of her laugh and their eyes widened when they saw Ari standing by him and then the girls scowled so fiercely that the Winter Soldier was actually surprised. Ari grinned wickedly at them and then said, "Okay, Soldier, let's get inside." They got the bags from the car and then she led the way, still laughing silently to herself. The Winter Soldier followed, mystified; what was so funny? Had Ari lost her mind?

She led him through a side door that led directly to the hallways and down the hall, up a flight of stairs, down another hall and to a door that said 246. She paused for a moment and then said, "Okay…I don't mean to be awkward…but they didn't have two rooms available. They were all full up. They only had one room."

The Winter Soldier stared at her and then he said, "I'll sleep in the car." One room. One bed. He liked Ari well enough by now but sharing a bed with her would have put him more on edge than a cat who'd just had its tail stepped on and a bucket of ice water thrown on it. The thought of being that close to any human made him feel trapped and anxious.

"Soldier, relax," scoffed Ari. "It has double beds. Who do you take me for?"

"Oh." The backs of the Soldier's neck and ears burned and he didn't understand this strange feeling that was coursing through him; was it embarrassment? He'd never really felt this way before. He'd never messed up before, never had cause to be embarrassed or humiliated. Was acting truly human always so annoying and full of unwanted feelings?

She unlocked the door and they carried the bags in, shutting the door behind them. The room was relatively large with two beds, two nightstands with lamps, a table, a sofa, a TV, and closet and a bathroom. The carpet was dark green, the walls were cream, and the beds were white. Standard average hotel fare. Nothing too cheap, nothing too fancy. The Winter Soldier dumped the bags he was holding on the bed and sat down on the bed near the window. He chose that one purpose; the window was a possible exit in case of an emergency and he wanted to be near enough to be able to shatter it and be out of it in seconds, if need be.

"Now tell me why those girls were staring," he demanded. "And why did you laugh?"

Ari grinned at him. "You're like a twelve-year-old. This is amazing. Soldier, they didn't recognize you—they thought you were cute. They were giggling because they were teenage girls and they thought you were attractive."

The Winter Solder blinked, feeling extremely out of his depth and confused. He knew he wasn't ugly… He'd never actually given much thought to his looks, because why would he? He'd had no cause to care before. He didn't have a personal life at HYDRA and his looks hadn't mattered. Still, a vague part of him had known that he at least was more decent-looking than some of the ugly, wrinkly old men he had killed. And Bucky Barnes had been popular with women, if his memories were any indication. But the person he was now, the Winter Soldier he was now…this was all very awkward and strange. He wasn't used to being stared at, especially not by women. They liked his face? They probably wouldn't if they knew the kinds of things the person behind the face had done.

"And then they glared at me because I'm a woman," explained Ari. "They were sort of jealous. They thought I'm with you."

"You are with me," said the Winter Soldier automatically.

"Soldier. They thought I was with you. As in, dating you. As in your girlfriend. Or wife, I guess," she added after thinking for a moment. "Whatever."

Now the Winter Soldier wanted to change the subject. The thought of being so intimate with anyone was horrifying and terrifying all at the same time. But for some reason, Ari sat down on the bed across from him and seriously asked, "How does that make you feel?"

Like running away to the other end of the earth, he wanted to respond, but he didn't know if that would be appropriate. What was Ari asking? Did she actually have some sort of feelings for him? If she did, he would silently slip away in the middle of the night and find Captain America on his own. He didn't have the capacity to deal with things like this. "What do you mean?" he finally asked.

"Soldier, I'm not in love with you," said Ari, smiling. "I can see the worry on your face. I've come to recognize it; you look around like a cornered animal, like you want to punch your way out of the room. So relax. I have no interest in a romantic relationship with you. First of all, you're not…exactly my type. No offense. Second of all, I consider you my patient—even if you're an unofficial one—and that would be highly inappropriate and crossing boundaries that I am not willing to cross. It would be unethical. What I meant was…how does the idea of someone being in a relationship with you make you feel?"

"Like dying," he said honestly, knowing she was asking to assess him.

"What do you mean by that?" she asked, crossing her legs. Her expression had gone calm, straight-faced, and her tone had gone neutral and pleasantly inquisitive. She was in nurse mode in the blink of an eye.

"I can't…that's not…no," he finally said. The eloquence of his response was truly breathtaking.

"Are you saying that you don't feel ready for that?" she asked.

"Yes," he said. "I mean, no. I mean, yes, I don't feel ready."

"Why do you think that is?" she asked.

He scowled. "Why do you think? I don't…I don't even know who I am, how to be a normal person. I don't even have friends. How could I…how could I ever be close to someone…that way? I don't—I don't know how I would even…" The Winter Soldier had never wanted to smash open a window and escape so badly before in his life.

"That's fine," said Ari, seeing that he was struggling. "Thanks. That's all I wanted to know." And to his immense relief, she got up and left, saying, "I'll go get some food for you. It's best if you're not seen by many people."

While Ari was gone, the Winter Solder paced the room back and forth like a caged panther—an extremely irritable panther. Tomorrow. Tomorrow he would meet Captain America. Also known as Steve Rogers. Also known as…his best friend. After he'd saved Steve from drowning in the river, he'd gone to the Smithsonian to see the Captain America exhibit and he'd seen his face staring down from several of the screens and photos. Or, at least, it looked like his face. It was more clean-shaven, with short cut hair and a handsome face, whether he was laughing with Steve Rogers or staring pensively into the distance. He looked like a good guy, like an honorable hero. Now…the Winter Soldier crossed the room and looked into the mirror. A man with shadows under his narrowed eyes and straight-set brows and a stubbly face and long messy brown hair stared back at him. Someone who looked dangerous and angry. Was it just the looks that did it? Perhaps he should cut his hair, shave his face perfectly clean, try to smile more.

He tried to smile at himself in the mirror but it felt awkward and fake. He looked like he was in pain. He dropped the smile and turned away. He didn't like seeing the animal he had become in the mirror.

The door opened and Ari entered, carried two bags with the McDonald's logo. "Sorry it's fast-food," she said, handing both bags to him. "I know it's gross—but there was nothing else proper nearby. So…"

"You're not eating?" he asked.

"I'm not hungry," she said, "and I ate in the car. Also, I had no idea what you liked, so…"

"You got one of almost everything, it looks like," said the Winter Soldier, peering into the bag. His mouth twitched into something that somewhat resembled a smile and Ari gasped and then grinned at him. "Soldier, did you just smile at something I said?" His mouth twitched even further and she said, "Wow, was that the first time you've smiled since the 40's?"

His smile fell off his face and she immediately looked ashamed of herself. "I'm sorry," she murmured. "I don't know what's wrong with me. That was so insensitive—"

"It's fine," he said. She didn't need to apologize. He was almost positive she was correct. He ate his food while Ari read a book on her bed with her earbuds stuck into her ears. After he was done eating (he ate almost all of it, too, since he was that hungry), he sat on his bed, having no idea what to do now. He felt a bit cramped and twitchy. Back at Ari's house, he could have sat on his bed and zoned out but he felt strange zoning out in front of Ari, even though she wasn't even paying him any attention. So he examined his palms. They had several deep scars on them, gashes that had healed from his last battle in D.C. He always came back with some sort of wound from his missions…but HYDRA healed him until it was like he was brand-new. Never again would that happen. He would have to actually take care of himself now. Somehow the thought was enticing, even if it meant having to be more careful with himself. He felt like he had some sort of control over himself. He could live—or he could die. It was up to him.

"Catch!" said Ari suddenly. He looked up to see a book flying at his face. He grabbed it using his lightning-fast reflexes before it smashed into his face and glared at her. "What kind of nurse are you? That could have hit me."

"I knew you'd catch it," she said. "I've seen your reflexes. They're unlike that of any other human being." She grinned. "You look bored. Read it. It's amazing."

He looked down at the book in his hand: A Game of Thrones by George R. R. Martin. The Winter Soldier could read but he had never read a book for fun before. He didn't even have any memories of James Buchanan Barnes reading for fun, though the Winter Soldier was sure he must have done it at some point. He flipped the book over and read the back. Wars, kings, betrayal… It seemed interested so he shrugged and settled back onto his bed, flipping open to the first page.

The book was actually very interesting and reading helped lull him into a state of peace he never knew he could feel. He actually forgot to fret and agonize over HYDRA and Steve Rogers for once and the time slipped by without him even noticing it, also something new. Even though he was a master at zoning out and sitting still for hours, he was still aware of every minute passing by slowly like the dying flicker of a pulse beneath red and purple bruised skin. Slow throbbing. Painful.

In fact, he didn't even notice how much time had gone by until Ari disappeared to the bathroom to wash up and returned wearing a t-shirt and black track pants. "I'm going to bed," she said. "You should too. We're going to be up early. Steve Rogers runs at five a.m. apparently and driving to the Washington Monument will take time too."

The Winter Soldier went to the bathroom, washed up, and changed into the black t-shirt and black track shorts Ari had gotten him as sleepwear. He walked to his bed, highly conscious that his cybernetic arm was showing—he tried to keep it hidden as much as possible—but Ari had already hidden herself in her blankets and showed no signs of stirring. He climbed into his bed and turned his bedside light off and the room was thrown into darkness, which just the slightest sliver of light coming from the slit in the curtains. The moon was full tonight and he found himself staring at the ceiling for a long time, thinking about nothing, listening to the sound of Ari's breathing.

And then, suddenly, Ari whispered—so quietly that he actually wasn't sure if she meant for him to actually hear—"Soldier? I know you said you had no friends." There was a silence, such a long one that the Winter Soldier almost began to wonder if he'd imagined her speaking, but then she said, "You're wrong. You have me. I'm your friend."

And then the night was silent and the Winter Soldier suddenly didn't feel so restless anymore. He fell asleep and his breaths matched Ari's in time, two people in separate worlds and yet somehow on the same plane.