Avengers: Search for the Winter Soldier

Chapter 12

Fever Dreams

Steve invites Sam to join him and Natasha when they go to see the Soldier; he agrees. The Soldier wakes from a fevered dream and gives the team their first real taste of the fight ahead of them.

Steve and Natasha were sitting together for breakfast the next morning when Dr. Golden entered the room. They both greeted her and invited her to join them. She nodded and went to the kitchen to see what the offerings were this morning.

As she was filling her plate, Wanda placed a steaming mug of hot tea on the counter in front of her. "Thank you, Wanda."

"How is everything going so far?" she asked.

"As well as can be expected to this point, I suppose. I haven't had much personal interaction with Sgt. Barnes; but have been focused on Captain Rogers and trying to bring him up to date on the Soldier's history. That's been rough, at times."

"I'm sure," Wanda nodded. "I can't imagine how he must be feeling. To learn that someone you cared so much for and thought they had died long ago….. if I know Steve Rogers, he's blaming himself for everything that happened to Barnes since 1943."

"And you'd be right," Dr. Golden acknowledged.

"Is there anything I can do?" Wanda offered.

Dr. Golden smiled at her and picked up her plate and mug. "Thank you, Wanda… I'll be sure to let you know if anything comes to mind."

"Please do," Wanda replied with a nod.

Dr. Golden turned away from her and came face to face with Sam Wilson who had just made it before the food was all gone. "Mr. Wil… Sam, good morning," she greeted with a smile.

"Emily," he smiled back. He was wearing his morning gear and it was clear he'd just returned from his run. He opened the fridge and removed the carafe of orange juice. He pulled a tall glass from a cupboard and poured, returning the carafe to the fridge.

"Would you care to join us?" Emily invited him, gesturing toward the table where Steve and Nat were sitting.

"Umm," he hesitated and Emily knew what she feared would happen was happening.

"Please, Sam, we'd love for you to join us," she told him.

Sam looked her in the eye and she held his gaze until he caved. "Okay… be right there," he told her.

Emily smiled and continued her way to the table. She placed her plate and mug on the table and then took her seat on the tall bar style chair. The tables along the north wall were set on tall legs so those using them had an unimpeded view over the grounds. There were regular tables and chairs on the west wall of the dining area so there was something for everyone.

Before any conversation had a chance to get started their attention was pulled to the person who'd just stepped up to the table. Steve turned to see Sam standing there with a small plate and his usual glass of orange juice.

"Sam!" Steve greeted him with a big smile.

"Morning, Sam," Nat said with a wide smile as he took the last seat at the table.

"Well, that kind of greeting makes me feel better," he stated off-handedly.

Steve and Natasha both looked to Dr. Golden a bit confused. She simply grinned and shrugged. This was between the three friends and she was happy to let them sort it out.

"What does that mean?" Steve asked carefully.

"Oh, nothing," Sam shrugged, trying to play it off as unimportant.

"Nooo," Steve replied, drawing the word out slowly, "that meant something. What is it, Sam?"

"It's nothing, Steve," he replied. "I haven't seen much of you two in the past few days… wasn't sure if that was on purpose, is all."

Natasha just blinked at him, while Steve's face turned into a confused frown.

"You think we've been purposely avoiding you?" Steve asked him.

"Well… no, not at all," Sam shook his head as he poked his food with a fork. "It's just with… ya' know…"

Steve looked at Nat; she shrugged just as confused as he was.

"No," Steve said, "we don't know."

"With your old pal being here…" Sam mentioned and then felt he was being rather petty so he tried to change direction. "It must be a great feeling knowing he's back… and safe."

Steve was still blinking at him, confused. "Sam… are you under the impression that because Bucky is downstairs, I don't want you around?"

"No, no… of course not," Sam denied, but he was awful at lying.

"Wow," Natasha commented. "Keep your day job," she told him, "You suck at acting."

Dr. Golden tried to hide a smile by taking a bite from her fork and looking out the window.

"Sam, you and I are still friends," Steve told him. "Just because Bucky's back doesn't change that fact."

"Well, I just figured… I know how much he means to you… I think we all know how much he means to you. I mean the way you talk about him… I mean, I was wondering if y'all were in love or something," Sam told him.

Natasha chuckled out loud at that one and even Steve couldn't help smiling and then finally laughed softly. He had to think about that for a moment though and he let out a soft grunt.

"I guess I go a little overboard when I talk about him, huh," Steve mentioned.

"A little?" Sam responded.

"Okay, okay," Steve nodded, still smiling, but Sam's comment drove home just how much he truly loved James Barnes. Maybe it was not normal, or maybe his feelings for his friend were considered outrageous… but he couldn't pretend otherwise. Perhaps their feelings for one another did go almost to the point of 'infatuation'. He was lost in his own thoughts as he stared at the table a thousand yards away. "What's the difference between love and infatuation?" he asked, still not blinking.

Sam and Natasha just watched him and Dr. Golden turned her face away from the window to see them all waiting for an answer. She took a deep breath before speaking.

"Love," she said, "is a warm attachment and devotion to another person. Infatuation is a feeling of foolish or obsessively strong love or interest in another person… or thing," she told him.

"Oh yeah," Sam said with a nod. He pointed at Steve with his fork before stabbing a piece of melon from the fruit salad on his plate. "That's you all right. That whole 'obsessively strong love affair' you've had going on with Barnes since the 40's. You can't deny it, man. We all see it."

Steve's cheeks flushed pink at Sam's accusation then his expression turned serious. "Maybe so," he said, but it didn't matter how Sam felt about their relationship. It really didn't. "I can't help how I feel about him. I can't even really explain it."

"And you don't have to," Natasha assured him. "You and Barnes have a relationship that is… soul deep," she told him. "There aren't many friendships like that in this world. You don't have to explain it or justify it to anyone." She looked to Sam, hoping her words didn't come across as offensive to him and to what he'd said.

Sam was looking back at her and he seemed to realize how his words came across. He pursed his lips together and nodded. "She's right," he told Steve. "You don't have to explain it or defend it… especially to me."

"You're still my friend, Sam," Steve told him sincerely.

"I know," Sam assured him. "I guess I'm feeling a little… like a third wheel. I'll get over it."

Steve smiled at him. "You're not a third wheel."

"No, actually, you'd be a fourth wheel now that Barnes is back," Natasha told him with a smirk. "Steve is one, Barnes is two… I'd be the third wheel and you're actually the fourth wheel," she teased him.

"Oh that's how it is now, huh?" Sam chimed back in playful fun. "Oh I get it now… uh huh, we'll see." He stabbed another piece of fruit and muttered, "Yeah, we'll see who the fourth wheel is," he said, popping the fruit into his mouth and waving his fork at Natasha playfully.

The three friends shared a chuckle and Dr. Golden was very impressed at how easily such a sensitive subject had been handled by the three of them. She couldn't hide the smile on her face any longer.

"After breakfast we're heading down to check on him," Steve told Sam. "You want to come with us?"

Sam appreciated the invitation even though he was certain three days ago that he'd want nothing at all to do with the Winter Soldier or his potential recovery. It was strange how a few days to think about things can change a person's perspective. He turned his head to look at Dr. Golden and they shared a smile. Sam just looked at her for a few seconds and nodded before turning back to Steve.

"Yeah," he said, "I'd like that."

"Great," Steve replied and they all settled in to finish their meals.

As the last of the morning meal was finished, the four brought their plates to the kitchen where Wanda and Vision took their dirty dishes and shooed them away. "We'll take care of these. You go, take care of your friend," she told them.

"Thanks, Wanda," Steve said. He gave her a smile and squeezed her shoulder and then led the way to the elevator. They ran into Bruce as the doors opened. "Dr. Banner," he greeted. "We're on our way down now," he told him.

"Great," Bruce replied. "I'm just going to grab a bite and then I'll bring him something to eat. He was still asleep when I peeked in on him a little while ago. By the time you get him awake and settled I'll be there with food."

"Okay, sounds good," Steve told him as the others got into the elevator and waited for him. "See you downstairs then." He stepped in and the doors closed.

The Soldier was lying on top of the bed still fully dressed since the night before. They'd allowed him to rest there and he'd fallen asleep before the others had come back to put him to bed. They hadn't even secured his arms and legs, as they had found him sound asleep on his left side and didn't want to disturb him, but they did lock the door when they left the room. Now he stirred as a dark dream began to form in his sleeping brain.

He dreamed of the familiar darkness of the Hydra cell; he saw himself kneeling on the floor, cowering and trying to protect his head as half a dozen large men beat him. He was barely clothed and emotionally distraught. Psychologically, he was broken down and emotions flooded from him against his will as the hopelessness of his situation finally, fully penetrated his psyche. There was no hope for him. So many years… how many decades? No one was coming for him; no one even knew he was there.

On his knees he curled forward, pressing his forehead to the damp cold cement floor and cried, his fists curled into his hair and he was finally aware of his own screams as he stood in the cell watching himself… the self he used to be, before he became what he is now.

The Winter Soldier stood in silence watching from the shadows; watching as this man's life was being extinguished and his own life was being born in the cold cell. He stepped forward out of the shadows, toward the broken man on the floor. The Soldier stopped and looked down at Broken Man; he listened to his sobs and the muffled screams of anguish without being moved by them in any way. His gaze moved over the man on the floor, noting the bruises and scrapes on his back and arms, the ribs and vertebrae that protruded too far, his bare and dirty feet and legs, the tangled hair.

Broken Man reached out a hand and touched his boot. Soldier looked down at the bruised and bloodied hand now gripping the toe of his boot and then his gaze shifted to meet the glazed eyes of the man now looking up at him and pleading with him to help him… to kill him. The two stared at one another; the only sounds in the cell were the man's whimpered pleas and his own breath behind the mask he wore.

Then Soldier took a step back to shake that battered hand from his boot. Broken Man straightened slowly, still on his knees. His head dropped back to show his anguished face under the matted, unkempt hair and he cried… grieving the end of his life just before it ceased to exist. His lips were parted, showing his teeth now clenched against the onslaught of emotions, his eyes were squeezed shut as the desolation of his existence enveloped him… and as the complete acceptance of his situation finally saw him vanquished, the Broken Man vanished. He simply melted into thin air. Soldier stared at the spot where the man had been kneeling and saw that all that was left of him was a smeared stain on the cement floor where years of blood lost was now mixed with tears that he'd shed.

The man on the bed gasped as he jolted awake. His eyes burned and he blinked rapidly trying to escape the visions lingering behind his eyelids. He took a deep breath, then another and rolled onto his back. The room tilted and he had to close his eyes again. He felt cold but on fire; that sensation confused him. He was covered in sweat and the light cotton tee was sticking to his back and chest. The denim jeans he was still wearing seemed to hold in the fire that heated his flesh. He rolled over again to get on his right side; he needed to stand to pull them off. He reached for the bed rail with his left hand and used it to push himself into a seated position on the edge of the bed. The room spun and slipped off the edge just as the door opened.

Steve stepped in first and saw the Soldier just as his feet touched the floor. "Hey, buddy… you're awake." He noticed immediately that his friend was sweating profusely and his face was flushed, his long hair was sticking to his forehead and cheeks, he was gasping for air as if he couldn't catch his breath, and it all happened faster than it takes to tell. Steve, suddenly concerned, asked, "You okay?" as he moved forward.

The Soldier's feet touched down and he had no sense of which way was up. The room spun wildly and he lost his balance, falling into the IV stand next to the bed. It crashed to the floor and Barnes went down with it.

"Bucky!" Steve shouted and ran to him. Natasha and Sam followed quickly to be of assistance.

The Soldier caught quick images of people coming at him fast. He didn't know what was happening but the dream and the present mixed together in his head. He let out a loud whimper and scrambled to the wall behind the bed. He was down on one knee and curled himself into a defensive ball as his metal arm came up over his head as a shield.

The sight of Barnes in that condition and now cowering in front of them made Steve slam on the brakes. He was a few feet away still and he slowly got down on a knee with his hands outstretched to show Bucky he meant no harm. Barnes remained still; shielding his head from what they could only assume was an expected beating.

"Bucky," Steve said, hoping his friend could hear him. He watched him closely, taking in everything he could see. The damp, matted hair; the tee shirt drenched and clinging to his body; the flushed pink tones of his skin; and his entire body was trembling. He looked like he'd been through a wringer. Steve slid closer to him still on one knee.

Natasha and Sam watched as Steve tried to get the Soldier's attention. Natasha slipped her earwig into her ear and pressed the tiny button on its center to activate it. "Bruce, do you read me?"

"I read you," Banner replied as he paused his conversation with Dr. Golden.

"We need your help in the infirmary… right now!" she told him.

He could tell by the tone and urgency of her voice that she had an immediate situation. He abandoned his breakfast and told Dr. Golden, "We're needed in the infirmary!" The two doctors moved quickly to the elevator.

Steve slid right up next to Barnes and carefully laid his hand on the metal forearm and tried to guide it gently down so he could see what was going on. He was also quite aware that he could end up with that metal fist across the face at any moment. He applied gentle pressure and the arm slowly dropped.

Bucky was still curled up against the wall and wouldn't look up at him. Steve kept his left hand on the bionic arm and reached out with his right hand to pull away the damp strands adhered to Bucky's face so he could try to assess the situation. As he pulled the hair away Barnes suddenly straightened against the wall and gasped as if trying to get air exchange.

His hands clawed at his chest and ripped the tee shirt away, tearing it in half up the center. His eyes were open but unseeing and his head bobbed as if he was dizzy and off-balance. Once he got the shirt torn open, his back now against the cool wall, his hands plastered themselves to the wall to either side of him as if it was the only way to keep himself upright.

Steve reached out and grabbed onto him to try to help steady him. His hands gripped Bucky's torso around his ribcage and Steve pulled away with a shout. "His skin is on fire! He's burning up!"

Natasha grabbed a sheet from the bed and helped Steve drape it around Barnes as best they could. He tried to push them away whenever he felt hands touching him; his movements caused the sheet to fall away. Steve picked the sheet up from the floor, quickly folding it over and lunged at Barnes. All at once, as if in one swift move, he wrapped the sheet around Bucky and pulled him away from the wall; dropping and twisting himself around to sit on the floor with his own back to the wall Steve pulled Bucky into his lap, wrapping his arms around him and held him there as he tried to wrest free.

When they reached the lower level, Bruce turned right as he exited the elevator and ran to his lab; he was certain he would need his bag. A few days before he'd anticipated that Barnes would be coming up on the moment the drugs would start to withdraw from his system so he prepared his doctor's bag with everything he thought he'd need in any drug related emergency. Emily waited for him just outside the elevator doors. As he joined her again they could clearly hear what sounded like a physical altercation going on inside the Soldier's room.

Dr. Banner and Dr. Golden stepped through the door and paused only a second to assess the situation they were faced with. "Oh God," Bruce exclaimed softly and then moved to the two men on the floor. He glanced at the three people standing nearby and said "I need lots of ice and blankets!"

Emily and Natasha moved to get the items while Sam remained in place to help if he was needed. Steve had a real fight on his hands just trying to keep Barnes under his control. Dr. Banner opened his bag and took out an opaque case and opened it. Inside were a number of syringes filled with liquid at various dosages.

"I need his arm," Bruce told Steve. Steve adjusted his hold on Bucky to try to assist Banner. Barnes was not cooperating, but was completely unaware of his actions; so Sam stepped in to try to hold his legs still so Dr. Banner could do what he needed to without being injured.

"What is that?" Steve asked as Banner removed a loaded syringe from the case.

"This one is a sedative… enough to put down a small horse, so I'm hoping it'll work on him… a few minutes is all I'm hoping for." With Sam's help they were able to get a hold of his arm and Banner quickly injected him and pulled away before he was able to break off the needle in his arm. "Give that a few seconds," he said, trying to catch his own breath; his adrenaline was soaring.

Steve held on to Bucky as tightly as he could; instinct kicking in as he rocked back and forth as if trying to soothe his friend's frenzy. The heat emanating off his body seeped through the light sheet material as if it wasn't even there. "He feels like a furnace, Doc," he told Banner.

Bruce reached out and laid his hand on Bucky's forehead and pulled away. "I was afraid of this," he told Steve. "The anectine in his system is interacting with the other anti-psychotics he'd either ingested or was injected into his system. No doctor worth his salt would ever give a person the cocktail of anti-cholinergics and anti-psychotic meds that he's been given.

"Each one on its own would worry me and I have no idea how the mixture of them is going to affect him. His body temperature right now is life threatening, I'm really surprised he's not going into convul-"

Before he had a chance to finish the word, Barnes suddenly stopped moving and his entire body went rigid in Steve's arms. Steve looked down at him to see Bucky's eyes wide open and rolled over white, then his entire body began to convulse violently. "Doc!" Steve shouted even as Banner was scrambling to his feet.

"Get him up! On the bed! Now!" he instructed them.

Sam had stepped back as they began and now reached back in to grab onto Barnes as Steve shifted on the floor and got to his feet. Sam helped carry him to the bed and they laid him down just as the women returned with the blankets and buckets of ice.

Bruce pulled a pair of medical shears from his bag and handed them to Natasha. "Cut off those pants and get those socks off!"

As Natasha began cutting up the legs of the jeans, Emily pulled the socks off his feet. Steve was standing protectively beside Bucky's head making sure he didn't fling himself onto the floor. Sam was doing his best to hold the metal arm to the bed as the rest of his body flailed.

Bruce pulled the torn clothing away as Natasha finished cutting through the waist of the jeans. Banner threw a folded sheet over his body and Natasha and Emily helped him unfold it quickly to cover the fevered man. Once that was done, Banner grabbed a bucket and began pouring the ice over his patient.

He pushed the ice into Bucky's armpits and into the V of his groin. He poured the ice over his chest and around his neck, pushing it underneath the back of his neck.

As the sheet was becoming weighed down by the ice, it allowed the intense cold to seep through to his skin. The sudden and intense change in temperatures shocked Barnes out of his semi-conscious state. Images of being strapped down to a board in an ice cold room began to flood his mind. As Banner poured more ice on him, he was suddenly re-living a day of torture in Hydra's underground cell. As the room temperature was lowered to 20 degrees, he was covered in a sheet and soaked with ice water. Every nerve in his body screamed as it tried to shrink away from the freezer burn his entire body was engulfed in.

His eyes shot open and he screamed. He screamed and begged for them to stop. Steve held him down and closed his eyes. He tried to keep out the sounds of Bucky's screams, but as he closed his eyes, the image of Bucky falling from the train; screaming the same scream flashed vividly in his mind's eye. Steve opened his eyes and looked around, trying to ground himself in the here and now.

The intense temperature change against his burning flesh was too much for Barnes' brain to register properly and, mercifully, he passed out. His screams ceased and his entire body went suddenly limp under Steve and Sam's hands trying to pin him down. They both let go and stared at the unconscious man in shock.

"Doc?" Steve called out; terrified his friend had just died in his hands.

"He passed out, Steve. He's all right. He's alive," Bruce assured him. "Blankets!" he ordered and Emily grabbed one from the chair where she'd stacked them and she and Nat draped it over Barnes. "Another," Banner told them and they complied. Bruce stepped behind the bed and turned the knob on the oxygen nozzle sticking out of the wall behind the bed. He attached a non-re-breather mask and cannula to it. He dialed up the flow to deliver 15 liters at 100% and placed the mask over the Soldier's face, securing the band snugly behind his head to hold it in place.

A few moments later the tremors his body was experiencing in the wake of the convulsions ceased completely and he lay still. Banner quickly assessed his vitals and took his temperature so he could have an accurate record. "106.2," he read it aloud.

Banner went to his bag and gathered it up from the floor. He placed it on the tray nearby and brought it closer to the bed. He pulled another syringe from the container. "Excuse me, Steve. I need to get to his arm again."

"What's that?" Steve asked as he moved out of the way.

"Thorazine, anectine, and a few other things at a slightly lower dosage than what was present in his blood tests," he told him as he slipped the needle into the Soldier's arm and depressed the plunger.

"What?" Steve asked, concerned. "You said he should recover from the drugs if they were no longer being given to him. Why are you-?"

"Thorazine is a drug that requires the patient be weaned off, actually most anti-psychotics require the patient to be weaned off of them, not stopped cold turkey," he told them. "The amount of each drug they've been giving him exceeds all human safety standards and it's my guess that they never allowed the previous doses to leave his system before they injected him with more."

"Why do you say that?" Steve asked.

"…because they subdued his instinct to fight for his own self-preservation using anti-psychotics in order to gain control over him. Then they sent him on his missions and then when he returned they put him in the deep freeze. Cryo-stasis simply freezes the body precisely the way it is when it enters the freeze state. Then they'd wake him up and inject him again… with the previous drugs still in his system. All they kept doing was compounding one dose over another dose over another. We can't just let him come down cold turkey… his system is dependent on these drugs now. The drugs have altered his brain functions to the point that it doesn't know how to function without them.

"Anectine is a powerful muscle relaxant and I have no idea what the reasoning was for them to give it to him at all much less at the high doses in his system. It causes depression of the respiratory system, life threatening body temperatures as we're now seeing, excessive salivation, high or low blood pressure, high or low heart rate, abnormal heart rhythms… among a dozen other nasty things. Getting him off all of these safely is going to take a long and precise therapy schedule and I still have to figure out what that's going to be. I have no idea what we're dealing with. I've never seen this amount… of these types of drugs in one person at these levels and still have that person alive."

Steve stared at Bruce and then closed his eyes as that sank in. He opened his eyes and looked down at Bucky and then slowly leaned down to wrap his arm around the top of his head and held him in a gentle hug for a moment.

Natasha knew Steve wouldn't be leaving his side any time soon so she grabbed the chair from the foot of the bed and pushed it over for him to settle into. Steve gave her a sad smile as thanks and sat down.

Sam watched him from the opposite side of the bed and his own sense of compassion for Barnes that had been nonexistent before began to grow, now that he'd seen how this assassin had been created. He'd been wrong, the Winter Soldier wasn't some psychopath who gloried in his kills; he was a war veteran who'd been held as a prisoner of war and had all manner of heinous things done to him for decades. Sam realized that in all his years as a peer counselor for other vets suffering from PTSD, none had needed him more than this guy was going to… but they had Dr. Golden here for him now, so that was a good thing. He felt bad for Steve as well, knowing none of this was in any way easy for him to deal with.

Natasha and Emily left the room for a few minutes and returned with two stacked chairs each from the office down the hall. Sam walked around the bed and took the two from Dr. Golden and separated them; placing one for Dr. Banner and the other he took to the left side of the bed for himself. Natasha took one from Dr. Golden and set hers down near Steve but behind him so as not to interfere. Emily set hers down near Banner's so the two of them could converse if needed.

Steve hadn't realized that he'd dozed off with his head resting on the edge of the bed. As he woke from his nap, he reached out to Barnes and let his hand rest on Bucky's shoulder. Steve sat up as he realized his skin wasn't flaming hot any longer and actually felt cool to his touch.

"Doc?" he said to get Bruce's attention. Banner looked up from what he was doing and then stood up. "His skin is cool," Steve told him.

Bruce came over and touched Bucky's cheek with the back of his hand. He then pulled the blankets down and touched his chest and abdomen. "He's out of danger for the moment," Bruce told those gathered around. "We don't want him to catch a chill now… so I'm going to need help. We need to dispose of all the wet sheets and get him onto and under dry ones."

Natasha immediately reached out and gathered up the two blankets now cold and wet from the ice that melted beneath them. As she did that, Emily grabbed a fresh set of sheets and blankets to replace them.

With Banner's guidance, Steve and Sam gently pulled Barnes into a sitting position and held him there as Bruce pulled the wet sheets off the bed underneath his head and torso; they were soaked from the melted ice. As Bruce rolled the used one down, Emily was right behind him with a dry clean sheet. She tucked it around the edges of the bed and pulled it as far down behind Barnes as she could.

Steve and Sam lowered him onto the dry sheet and then rolled him to his left side. As the sheets were pushed out of the way and replaced beneath him, Bruce tugged down the soaked briefs he was still wearing and tossed them into the hamper nearby along with the used sheets. Sam helped Steve roll Barnes onto his right side to complete the task. Emily reached under Bucky's hip and pulled the edge of the sheet from under him and across the bed to secure it. With all hands helping it took only a couple of minutes to finish and settle him back down with fresh, warm blankets to cover him.

Bruce left the room and returned a few minutes later with an IV bag and tubing. He lifted the fallen stand from the floor and set it back up where it had previously been. He hooked the bag onto the stand and started a line. Steve watched him as he inserted the IV catheter in Bucky's arm, making a new mark among the scars he had there.

Dr. Banner finished his work and made sure the drip was properly feeding the line. He looked at Steve; and couldn't remember the last time Cap looked that spent. He gave him a gentle pat on the back of his shoulder as a sign of support. As he stepped away, Steve laid his head back down, folding his arm under his head as a pillow. His other hand rested on Bucky's arm, above the IV site.

Sam sat silently watching Steve as he tended to his friend. That kind of solid devotion was hard to come by, especially in present day. He was starting to understand a little of this crazy friendship the two men shared. He'd known identical twins that weren't this bonded to each other.

Natasha watched Sam as he studied Barnes' face for a long time, glancing at Steve now and again. After a while he sat back in his chair and looked across the bed. He caught her watching him and she smiled. Sam smiled back and crossed his arms to settle in until he was needed again.

TBC'd