Chapter 3: Making the List and Checking it Thrice

Bucky made it to New York in less than two days. He'd been dusted with half the universe, so he never really knew what life during the Blip was like until spending time on the road in the midst of it. Finding a car hadn't been a problem when half the population suddenly vanished, leaving behind all their possessions—including vehicles. The real issue had been finding something that was functional and abandoned.

He'd lucked out after a few trials and errors and found a good Samaritan to give an old Chrysler sedan a jump. The vehicle didn't seem like it had been sitting for too long, but it was too far from any homes or businesses to likely belong to someone, and Bucky saw no signs of hikers or recent occupancy. The dead battery told him it had probably been sitting for a while. The last thing he wanted was to be pulled over for driving a stolen vehicle, so he hoped no one would miss the car for at least a day or two.

To his surprise, the gas hadn't gone bad, and the engine roared to life. Thankfully, the folded platform fit in the back seat. He'd thanked the Good Samaritan – an older Persian gentleman who'd been driving by –and slipped him a twenty-dollar bill. The glowing box became inactive when detached and fit nicely in the glove compartment. There was little traffic on the road, and his drive to New York was easy.

He stopped twice for gas, supplies, and the restroom and once for food and sleep. The car didn't make the most comfortable bed, but he'd slept in far worse places. He picked up new clothes and changed in the car, grateful to be out of the filthy, marsh-soiled clothes that had dried stiff and scratchy. He'd certainly gotten some looks from the cashier, but at least now he appeared more presentable. He was sure he still reeked, however.

He checked into a lonely motel a few miles away from the Avenger's complex, paying in cash. He'd passed too many that had gone out of business and began to wonder whether he'd have to find an abandoned house. He needed electricity and wi-fi, however. The motel had both.

Once settled into the small room, he peeled out of his clothes and headed for the bathroom. He reached for the dog tags around his neck to pull them over his head, but his hand hit only bare skin, and he remembered they'd been taken during the booking process. The cool metal that was his only remaining connection to home was gone. They carried his name and the name of his sister – the person to notify in the event of his death during the war– and served as an ever-present reminder that he was James B. Barnes. If he ever lost his memory again, he had a silly notion that he could look down and the tags would tell him a little piece of his story.

A pang of new loss caused him to sigh. He knew they weren't important to the mission, and he was just being sentimental, but he suddenly regretted that they wouldn't be with him, nestled against his breastbone, when he took his last breath. Unfortunately, they were irretrievably gone.

He needed to focus on the mission and keep his head in the game, not let himself think too hard about dying and all the things he never got a chance to experience thanks to Hydra stealing his mind and a lifetime from him. He knew how to do this – put one foot in front of the other and focus on what needed to be done next. At the moment, that was taking a shower.

In ten minutes, he felt human again, drying off as he headed into the main room. The accommodations were sparse – a twin bed, a tiny bathroom, and old furniture. A small fridge housed the food and beverages he'd bought at the gas station earlier. The rug had several stains he didn't want to think too hard about. He'd watched reports about the hardships caused by the Blip – too much infrastructure and too few people. Labor shortages. Surpluses elsewhere. Abandoned properties. Decay. Endangered species that were on the brink of extinction being effectively wiped out by Thanos' snap.

But there had been a few positives – cleaner air and water, less traffic, a housing surplus. Even the night sky seemed brighter. It reminded him a bit of being back in the 40s. Then, the world's population had been about two-and-half billion – but of course the housing, infrastructure, and job market had matched the smaller size. The night sky, however, had been brighter back then, too. He'd loved looking up into the myriad stars. Even in Brooklyn, back in the 40s, he could look up and admire the cosmos.

Modern day Brooklyn, however, drowned out most of the celestial view.

Bucky sat in the small chair across from the bed, pulled out the tablet and flash drive, and slipped the drive into the port on the side of the device.

He entered the passwords, smiling and thinking of Sam as he typed in the Thanos-related profanity.

He spent the next few hours going over the data of the battle—reviewing notes from the debriefings, Sam's notes, and writing his own recollections in the notebook to track the location of the gauntlet. He briefly considered using the platform to actually go back and observe—perhaps even secretly film the battle for later review in a reconnaissance trip—but realized on the second trip back he'd likely just run into himself filming and then there might be two or three Bucky's in one timeline. He wasn't sure what the hell that would do to the fabric of reality, so he nixed the idea quickly.

Fortunately, they had battlefield footage from the Stark suits- so he had quite a bit of video to review. Unfortunately, even with those recordings, there were blind spots on the battlefield. Bucky knew the gauntlet with the stones had taken quite the journey from the destroyed complex, passing at various points from Clint to T'Challa, Peter Parker, Danvers, Thanos…and, of course, Tony. Bucky just had to figure out the perfect moment—when the gauntlet was unguarded, vulnerable, and accessible—to make his move.

The motel had a small TV, and a few hours into his review, he took a break and flipped on the screen. He set the tablet on the tiny table next to the chair and plugged it in to charge, then rose to his feet, grabbed a beer from the fridge, popped the cap, and returned to his chair.

He mindlessly watched television for a few minutes, rubbing his eyes and shoulders. It had been a long, long, long couple of weeks between Siberia, time traveling to 2014, then back to 2024, the road trip, getting arrested, traversing miles of terrain on foot, staking out the cabin, and now this.

He hadn't had a moment to catch his breath.

He recognized the actors on the screen. It was a Star Trek episode—one from the 90s, he was pretty sure. He'd discovered Star Trek recently thanks to Steve's book. Apparently, there were lots of Star Treks. He had no idea which version this was, but he recognized the yellow android and the man with the beard…except in this episode the bearded commander had a twin dressed in a yellow uniform.

Bucky grabbed the pen and notebook from the satchel next to his chair and began jotting down the basics of a plan he'd formulated during the road trip. The TV played in the background as he scribbled thoughts, ideas, and amends. He didn't know how much time he'd have to use the stones, so he made a list of priorities.

The first item on the list was the easiest—destroy Thanos and his entire army. After that, he just started writing, then numbering and renumbering, using up page after page in the notebook. Adding names, then scratching them off, trying to decide how far back to go, whose lives to touch, and in what order.

Natasha was a name he kept adding and scratching off. He knew Banner had tried unsuccessfully to bring her back. If Banner couldn't do it when he had the gauntlet, then what the guardian of the soul stone told Clint must have been true. There was no way to bring her back. If Bucky spent futile time trying to resurrect her, he'd end up sacrificing something else on his list. He knew he'd only have a few seconds to use the stones before they killed him. He couldn't waste a single, precious second.

The TV played in the background. He occasionally glanced up at it, half-listening to talk of transporters and dual energy beams as he worked and re-worked his list. At some point, his eyes grew heavy, and he felt himself drifting. The notebook rested on his lap, and the pen clattered to the floor as he surrendered to sleep.

-0- -0- -0-

He was in a small, room, dimly lit by weak overhead lights. An empty, rusted chair was pushed against the far wall. His left arm was restrained against the steel wall by two thick metal vices. His right arm hung free. His ankles were shackled. Everything hurt, even his stomach. His mouth tasted like sand. His lips were cracked and bleeding. He couldn't remember the last time he'd been allowed food, water, or sleep.

Two guards stood on either side of him, stiff and watchful. One held a gun, the other a modified electric prod about the size of a child's baseball bat.

The sound of a woman's scream rose from somewhere outside the room, faint but unmistakable, then gradually became louder, closer.

The door opened, and the screams caused him to wince. His gut twisted. Three men entered. Two carried a struggling, screaming woman. The third man he recognized as the Commander. The woman looked young, but with her face contorted and her thrashing, her age was hard to guess. Her blonde hair flung wildly around her face as she fought her captors.

The two men pushed the woman into the chair and bound her wrists to its metal arms, then shackled her legs to rings sunk into the cement floor. She wore only a blue hospital-style gown with short sleeves. Her feet were dirty and bare.

She looked at him, her chest heaving. A large gash near her left eye oozed blood. Her bottom lip was split and bleeding.

The commander approached him and held out a pistol. "Kill her." The man's Russian accent was thick, his voice hard.

He suddenly couldn't breathe. He shook his head. The commander returned the firearm to his side.

The electric prod jammed into his side so quicky he didn't have time to register it before the current seared through him. His screams filled the small room, ripping from his throat. His legs buckled. Everything went black and quiet.

A shock of ice cold brought him to awareness. He was wet. He looked up. He was hanging by his left arm. His legs refused to move. A ringing sound filled his skull.

The Commander stared at him. "Now watch what your refusal has done."

One of the guards near the woman calmly undressed himself below the waist, then walked up to the woman and yanked up her gown.

He closed his eyes.

"Watch or I will kill her slowly."

He took a shuddering breath and forced his eyes open. The guard was on top of her. Her screams battered the air.

When it was finished, she sat, sobbing, as the guard calmly dressed himself. The commander retrieved the pistol from his side and held it out.

"Shoot her."

He sobbed and shook his head.

The prod found its mark again. He wasn't sure how long he was out. When he came to, his left shoulder ached. His gut was on fire.

"Now watch what your refusal has done," the Commander ordered again.

The other guard slipped a large knife from a sheath around his belt and brought the blade down with a quick, hard stroke, slicing through two of the woman's fingers. She howled.

"Please…" He struggled against the clamp holding his arm, but he felt as weak as a newborn. His legs barely moved. The room spun.

The Commander held out the firearm. "Shoot her."

"I…I…can't…"

This time he didn't even feel the electricity. He just knew he lost time, and when he came to, the Commander was standing over him.

"Now watch what your refusal has done."

Bucky gasped awake, the sound of gunfire bringing him instantly alert, and he bolted out of his chair. It took his brain a second to process the unfamiliar surroundings. A small television sat atop a dark, worn cabinet. A car chase played on the screen, and a man hung out the side window of an old sedan, firing at a small red car ahead.

Bucky collapsed back into the chair, trembling with the residual horror of the nightmare…the memory from 75 years ago. His nightmares had slowly been getting less frequent, but they still plagued him. He hadn't dreamed of her in almost six months.

During his last time travel adventure, Tony had said that sometimes you travel through time, and sometimes time travels through you. Bucky wondered whether parts of his brain had reset to 2023 or whether the stress was simply getting to him, lowering his defenses. He did his best to push her image and the shame it evoked out of his mind.

Since he knew sleep wouldn't come again for some time, he grabbed the tablet and fired it up, then spent the next two hours reviewing battle footage from the Stark helmets. Every time he saw Steve, he stopped breathing and a hard lump formed in his throat.

He tried to take solace in the fact that, after he completed his mission, he'd never again be plagued by the faces from his past—not his victims' and not Steve's.

-0- -0- -0

The next day, Bucky left the hotel room once to pick up food, then returned and got back to work. He sat in the chair, a spiral notebook in his lap and a discarded take-out bag and empty containers in the nearby trash can. His gaze drifted over the page with the final list. He recited it in his head over and over again. He mouthed the words. He went over the list so many times, that when he closed his eyes, he could see the words and the images they evoked almost as clearly as if he were looking at the page.

Once satisfied that the list was so ingrained that his dying brain would be able to work through as much of it as effortless as possible, he turned the page and focused on the other list he'd created-the four options he'd scribbled down.

The hours of watching and re-watching video footage and re-reading debriefing notes had paid off. There were four moments during the battle with Thanos when the gauntlet glove had the infinity stones and was not in the hands of someone else.

The first was after Thanos destroyed the Avenger's complex. Clint had found the glove in the rubble. Since the gauntlet would be almost impossible for him to get to, he'd already scratched that option off the list.

The second moment was when T'Challa took a hit from Thanos and dropped the glove, but he determined that moment was too risky. Thanos' telekinetic henchman had been on it almost immediately.

The third was when Peter Parker took an almost direct hit from Thanos' ship, but there was too much firepower blowing everything to hell. Getting to the glove without being hit himself would be almost impossible. In fact, he had almost been blown to hell – he'd taken a near direct hit himself, which had knocked him unconscious for a few minutes. When he'd come to, Thanos' ship had been destroyed by Danvers.

The fourth moment came shortly after Thanos had blown up the van. Bucky focused on that one. If he could manage to be out of sight, at that exact place, at just the right moment, he'd be able to grab the gauntlet. He'd only have a window of a few seconds, but it was very doable.

With his plan solidified, he turned the page in the notebook to reveal a clean sheet of paper. There'd be no time to explain anything to Steve or the others once he used the infinity stones. The blank paper in front of him would be the vessel for his final words. He knew he needed to write something, but staring at the empty canvas overwhelmed him. There was too much he wanted – needed—to say, but explaining himself eloquently in words was never a skill he developed. He'd always felt more comfortable letting his actions speak for his heart. He hoped, this last time, his actions would fill the gap left by the words he knew would fall short. He wasn't sure the right words even existed in any of the languages he knew.