Seven o'clock was approaching and the spaghetti had not yet been started. I began to pull out the ingredients when Bucky came over to assist me.

     "You don't have to help," I told him frankly.

     Honestly, I felt bad having Bucky help me since he only had one hand.

     He turned to me with his kind blue eyes. "I know. But I want to help you."

     "Fair enough," I relented, somehow knowing that there was no way to get rid of him.

     "What can I do?" he offered.

     "You could grab the frying pan and spatula for me."

     Bucky handed me the desired items.

     "Thanks."

     The ground beef was cooked and the fat drained off a few minutes later. I put the meat on two paper plates for the time being.

     "How are we going to cook the noodles without a pot?" Bucky asked with a slight frown.

     "We can cook the noodles in the frying pan, silly."

     His frown deepened, but I did not know if it was because I had instantly presented a solution to something that was never even a problem or because of my playful name-calling.

     Deciding it did not matter which one it was, I put the noodles in the frying pan and poured some water over them before turning on the stove eye. The noodles were soon done to perfection.

     I showed Bucky the result. "See? Told you it would work."

     He tried a noodle and then raised his eyebrows in surprise.

     "It's better to do them in a frying pan than in a pot," I informed him as I dished the noodles equally between three paper plates.

     When I was done, Bucky took the frying pan over to the sink.

     "What are you doing?" I asked.

     "I was going to dump out the noodle water," he explained.

     I was appalled. "No!! You don't dump it out! You use it in the sauce!"

     "It's just leftover noodle water," he said, obviously ignorant.

     "Yeah and throwing it out would just be wasteful." I scowled at him.

      He shrugged and put the frying pan back on the counter with the water still in it.

     I added a few cans of tomato sauce and the cooked ground meat into the pan before placing it back on the stove.

     "What are you going to season the sauce with?" Bucky asked.

     "Just salt, I guess? That's all we have."

     "Uh-uh, that ain't going to work, Doll."

     Irritated, I asked him, "What else do you want me to do?"

     "I'll get Steve to pick something up."

     Bucky took a device out of his pocket. It was the same kind of device I had seen Steve use when I first saw him.

      "What's that? Some type of miniaturized two-way radio?"

     "It's a cell phone," he replied.

     I was shocked. "That little thing is a cellular phone?!"

      Bucky nodded.

     "But how? It's so small!?"

     "I don't know how it works. I just know how to use it to make calls," he told me.

     Bucky pushed some buttons and put the tiny phone to his ear.

     "Hey. Steve, you better come back with some spices and herbs for this spaghetti sauce or else I'm going to have old Lady Cusimano's ghost haunt for the rest of your days."

     "Who is old Lady Cusimano?" I asked once he got off the phone.

     "She was this big Italian woman who lived in our neighborhood in Brooklyn back in the day. Had like forty grandchildren and cooked the best food you've ever had in your life. Handmade noodles, world-class spaghetti sauce, and these meatballs you could die for. She could be mean sometimes, but deep down everyone loved her."

     This was a good memory of his. I knew he did not have many left anymore so I just smiled before saying, "Sorry I'm not making meatballs. Takes too much meat and too much time to make them. It's much less wasteful to just have the ground beef mixed in with the sauce."

     Bucky tipped his head to the side. "You're all about not being wasteful, aren't you?"

     I shrugged off his observation.

     Just before seven, Steve came back with his arms full of shopping bags.

     He handed Bucky a small brown paper bag. "There's your herbs and spices, pal."

     Bucky brought the bag over to the stove and pulled out the little glass bottles.

     "I can season the sauce, Bucky," I told him.

     He seemed hesitant. "I know, but-"

     "Do you not trust my ability to cook?" I raised an eyebrow at him.

     "N-no?"

     "Good. Then I'll do it."

     I added the seasonings to the sauce and then poured the sauce over the noodles.

     "Food is ready," I told the boys.

     "After dinner and the dishes are done, we are going to watch a movie," Steve announced happily.

     I asked, "What movie?"

     Steve smiled. "It's a surprise."

     "Before that though, I have another history lesson for you. This is the last big story, at least for a while," Steve promised.

     I took a big bite of my spaghetti and buckled in for another one of his narratives.

     "On May 3rd of this year, we received some intel that an ex-HYDRA agent was in Lagos, Nigeria. Hoping it was Bucky, I mobilized the team minus Vision and Rhodes due to the level of stealth the mission required. It turned out Bucky wasn't there, but that Brock Rumlow was."

     "He was badly burned during the Battle at the Triskelion and was now calling himself Crossbones. Rumlow had been robbing police stations in various countries and selling weapons to terrorists."

     "Lovely," I commented sarcastically.

     "We figured that he and his mercenaries would continue following the regular M.O., but now they were robbing an Institute for Infectious Diseases laboratory."

     I asked, "He moved up to bio-warfare?"

     "Rumlow was planning on selling the biological agent to the highest bidder," Steve confirmed.

     "We intercepted him in a little market area. He attacked me. Wanted revenge for having had a building dropped on his face."

     "I defeated him and asked him who his buyer was. He said, 'You know, he knew you. Your pal, your buddy, your Bucky. He remembered you. I was there. He got all weepy about it. Till they put his brain back in a blender. He wanted you to know something. He said to me, "Please tell Rogers. When you gotta go...you gotta go." And you're coming with me.'"

     "Pretty sure I never said that, by the way," Bucky said without looking up from his plate of food.

     Steve continued, "Rumlow detonated a suicide vest. Wanda was able to contain the explosion with her powers and then threw Rumlow into the air, where he exploded. There was a building nearby and 26 people were killed by the explosion."

     "No," I whispered in horror.

     "The public's opinion of us turned after that. Every day there was something on the news tearing us down."

     "Wanda had severe guilt over what happened."

     "It wasn't her fault," I said. "She saved your life and the lives of everyone else who were inside the blast radius on the ground."

     "That's what I told her. I admitted that I should have clocked the bomb vest long before it went off. Rumlow said, 'Bucky' and all the sudden I was a sixteen year old kid again in Brooklyn." Steve shook his head.

     "You're not God, Steve. You can't save everyone," Bucky consoled his friend.

     Steve murmured, "I know and people died because of me. We try to save as many people as we can. Sometimes that doesn't mean everybody."

     After a minute or two of silence, Steve resumed his story.

     "After that Tony and the Secretary of State, Thaddeus Ross, arrived at the Compound. Secretary Ross accused us of being vigilantes, dangerous, reckless, selfish, and unconcerned about the destruction that we leave behind."

     Steve clinched his jaw when he said, "He showed us footage of the Battle of New York, the Battle at the Triskelion, the Battle of Sokovia, and the Lagos Catastrophe."

     "And he made you watch all of that?" I asked, feeling sorry that Steve had been forced to relive some of the worst moments of his life because someone had decided to re-play them for him.

     "Yes, until I told him that was enough. He said the solution to the problem was the Sokovia Accords, Framework for the Registration and Deployment of Enhanced Individuals."

     Steve elaborated, "It would make the Avengers no longer a private organization. Instead we would have to operate under the supervision of a United Nations panel, only when and if that panel deemed it necessary. He told us that in three days the UN was going to meet in Vienna and ratify the Accords."

     "Secretary Ross said that compromise and reassurance are how the world works and that this was the middle ground. We were told we would either ratify the Accords or be forced to retire."

     "What did you do?" I asked.

     "We had a group discussion that turned into a group disagreement," Steve replied.

      "After that, Sam and I went to London for some personal business."

     "While we were there, we found out that Tony, Rhodes, and Vision had all already signed. Natasha was planning to sign. Wanda had not decided yet. Clint and Sam were both retiring."

     "And you?"

     "I couldn't sign it. That document took away our rights as human beings and our freedom of choice," Steve stated with conviction.

     "A bomb was set off at the Vienna International Centre while the UN was in session there. Over 70 people were injured and 12 died, including King T'Chaka of Wakanda who we told you about. They had a video of Bucky setting up the bomb."

     I looked over at Bucky. He was still intently eating his spaghetti.

     "I called Natasha to make sure she was okay. She told me that she was and that if I went looking for Bucky I would be arrested."

     "The S.H.I.E.L.D. agent who had been posing as a nurse across from my apartment in D.C., her name is Sharon Carter. She was willing to help me out and give me a headstart on finding Bucky. Sharon also told me that they weren't planning on bringing him in alive," said Steve before motioning to Bucky that it was his turn to speak.

     Bucky started, "I was out buying plums in the market because I had heard that eating them is good for your memory or whatever."

     "There was this guy staring at me so I went over to him. He had been reading the newspaper. I took a look at it and the headline was 'WINTER SOLDIER WANTED FOR THE VIENNA BOMBING'. It even had pictures of me and everything." He shuddered.

     "I decided to go back to the apartment and get my things and escape. When I got back, Steve was already there going through my journal."

     "I asked him if he knew me," Steve said.

     Bucky answered, "I told him that he was Steve and I had read about him in a museum."

     "I replied that I knew he was nervous and had plenty of reason to be nervous, but that I also knew he was lying," Steve maintained.

     "I told him that I wasn't in Vienna and I don't do that anymore," explained Bucky.

     Steve shared, "I said I believed him, but that the people who think he did it were coming to his apartment right now and that they had been ordered to shoot him on sight."

     Bucky muttered, "It was a good plan."

     "I told Buck that this didn't have to end in a fight."

     "I answered that it always ends in a fight," Bucky said with sadness in his voice.

     Steve continued, "We were running low on time. I told him that he had pulled me from the river and asked him why he did it."

     "I told him I didn't know," Bucky concluded.

     "I told him that he did know. And that was when we had to fight our way out of the apartment against German Special Forces," explained Steve.

     "Everything was fine until this vicious guy in a black cat-like suit showed up." Bucky glowered. "He started chasing me."

     Steve added, "I started chasing him and Sam was right behind me. I stole a car so I could keep up with them."

     Bucky chuckled, "I stole a guy's motorcycle right from underneath him."

     It took me a second to process what he had said. "Wait, what!? How?!"

     Bucky just smirked all proud of himself.

     "The police finally caught up with us and Rhodes showed up in his suit with guns ablazing to tell us to stand down," Steve recalled. "It was kind of eerie being arrested after finding Bucky again."

     "And the man in the cat suit?" I asked.

     Steve answered, "He was Prince T'Challa."

      My eyes went wide. "The now king of Whaka-na-da?!"

      "Yes."

     Steve pulled up a picture of a man in a suit and then a picture of a black cat-like full-body suit with silver accents and silver claws.

     "Damn!"

     "Prince T'Challa, Sam, and I were taken to Berlin together. Bucky was transported separately," Steve went on.

     "I asked Prince T'Challa if his suit was made of vibranium. He responded that the Black Panther had been the protector of Wakanda for generations. That it was a mantle, passed from warrior to warrior and that now because his father had been murdered he must also wear the mantle of king. So he asked me, as both warrior and king, how long did I think I could keep Bucky safe from him."

     "Woah," I said under my breath.

     "Once we arrived at the Joint Counter Terrorist Centre Building in Berlin, I asked what was going to happen to Bucky."

     "Everett Ross, the Deputy Task Force Commander, said Bucky would get a psychological evaluation and extradition and that really I ought to get the same."

     I frowned. "Ross? Is he related to the Secretary of State?"

     "No. No relation between the two of them. Just both happen to have the same last name," Steve clarified.

     "Sharon was there too. I asked about a lawyer and Deputy Commander Ross laughed at me before instructing Sharon to see that our weapons were placed in lockup."

     "He told us that we were going to be provided with an office instead of a cell and that we could do him a favor by staying in it."

     "Natasha joined us and said 'For the record, this is what making things worse looks like.'"

     "Harsh," I commented.

     "I told her it was worth it though because Bucky was still alive," Steve remembered. "Natasha told us to try not to break anything while they fixed our 'mess'."

     "Tony was on the phone saying that what happened in Romania was not Accords-sanctioned. Colonel Rhodes was supervising cleanup. And there were going to be consequences for us."

     "When I asked about the 'consequences', Tony told me that Secretary Ross wanted Sam and I both prosecuted and that he had to give him something."

     "Then I asked if I was getting my shield back, Natasha said that technically it was the government's property now along with Sam's suit."

     "Sam said that was pretty cold. Tony replied it was warmer than jail." Steve laughed a humorless laugh.

   "Tony said he had pulled something from his dad's archives. It was the pens that FDR signed the Lend-Lease bill with in 1941. Tony said that they had provided support to the Allies when they needed it most."

     "I told him some would say it brought our country closer to war."

     "Tony replied that without what these pens had done, I wouldn't be here." Steve admitted, "And he was right."

     "He said that the pens were his olive branch."

     "Wanting to avoid the topic of the Accords, I asked him if his longtime girlfriend, Pepper Potts, was in Berlin and that I hadn't seen her."

     "Tony said that they were 'kinda' and then trailed off so I guessed 'kinda pregnant'," Steve said, shaking his head.

     "He said they were definitely not pregnant and that they were taking a break and it was nobody's fault. I apologized and told him I didn't know."

     "He explained that a few years ago he had almost lost her so he had trashed all his suits. Then we had to mop up HYDRA and then Ultron, which he admitted was his fault. And he never stopped because he didn't want to stop, but he didn't want to lose her either."

     "Tony thought maybe the Accords could help split the difference. And that in Pepper's defense, he is a handful which couldn't be any more true," Steve agreed. "Pepper is an amazing woman. I have no idea how she puts up with him as much as she does."

     "Tony recalled that his dad was a pain in the ass, but that he and Tony's mom had always made it work."

     "I told him I was glad his dad, Howard, got married because I only knew him when he was young and single." Steve smiled a far away kind of smile.

     "Tony said sarcastically that this dad only mentioned the fact that we knew each other maybe a thousand times."

     Steve paused as if he was in pain. "Then Tony said he hated me."

     "What?!" I exclaimed, shocked Tony would feel that way after all the two of them had been through together.

     "Yeah," Steve said emotionlessly. "That was my reaction too. I told him that I didn't mean to make things difficult."

     "He said he knew that because I'm a very polite person. I told him if I saw a situation pointed south that I couldn't ignore it."

     "Tony told me that sometimes he wished he could punch me in my perfect teeth. But that he didn't want to see me gone either and that the team needed me. He said so far nothing had happened that couldn't be undone if I just signed the Accords. He promised that Bucky would get transferred to an American psych-center instead of a Wakandan prison. In that moment, I almost signed," Steve confessed.

     "I told him that my signing wasn't impossible, but that there would have to be safeguards in place."

     "He said sure and that once the burning public relations fire was put out, that the document could be amended."

     "Tony said he'd even file a motion to have Wanda and I reinstated."

     "Wanda? You? Reinstated?" I asked in confusion.

     "That's what I said. I asked him about Wanda. Tony said she was fine and that she was confined to the compound currently and Vision was keeping her company."

     My face felt hot with anger. "He locked her away?!"

     "More or less, yes," Steve stated. "When I questioned him about it, he said it was for protection."

     "I asked him if he saw the Accords as protection. I told him it was an internment."

     "Tony shot back that Wanda isn't a US citizen and that weapons of mass destruction don't get visas granted to them."

     "I told him that she was just a kid."

     "He told me to give him a break because he was doing what had to be done to stave off something worse." Steve shook his head in disagreement.

     "I told him to keep telling himself that."

     "I didn't sign with his special pens or any other pens."

     "Next thing I did was watch the live footage of Buck meeting with the psychiatrist."

     Bucky fumed, "He kept calling me James. I told him my name was Bucky."

     "I asked Sharon why would the Task Force released the photo of Bucky to begin with. She said to get the word out and involve as many eyes as they could," Steve remarked.

     "I told her that it was also a good way to flush a guy out of hiding. Set off a bomb, get your picture taken, and get seven billion people looking for the Winter Soldier."

     "Sharon asked if I was suggesting that someone framed Bucky to find him."

     "Sam pointed out that we had been looking for Bucky for two years and found nothing," admitted Steve.

     "I told him that we didn't bomb the UN and that that turns a lot of heads."

     "Sharon maintained that didn't guarantee that whoever framed him would get him. It guaranteed that the Task Force would get him."

     "I agreed with her and we both became suspicious of the psychiatrist," Steve recalled his observation. "The power went out. Sharon told us where Bucky was being kept."

     "The 'doctor' had gotten the book. He said the code words," Bucky agonized.

     My lungs suddenly felt very empty. A memory had come to me of the words read from that horrible book.

     "The dark red book? The one with the star?" I whispered, afraid to even acknowledge that such a book was even real.

     Bucky stared deep into my eyes. "Yes. How did you know?"

     "My code words are in that book too."

     The look of horror that crossed his face made my heart want to break into a thousand tiny little pieces.

     "He could have controlled you too," Bucky breathed.

     I nodded slowly.

      Steve gave Bucky an encouraging smile.

     "He made me tell him about December 16th, 1991 and where I was kept in Siberia."

     "I grabbed the 'doctor' and asked him who he was and what he wanted. He said he wanted to see an empire fall," Steve said, after eating a bite of his spaghetti.

     "That's when the Winter Soldier attacked Sam and me."

     Bucky seemed frozen just at the mention of his mind controlled alter-ego.

     "I got thrown down an elevator shaft," Steve laughed dryly. "The Winter Soldier beat the shit out of some of the strongest people I know."

     "He got a hold of a chopper and was taking off in it when I caught up to him. I was able to keep him from taking off, but the helicopter fell into the river below. Bucky was knocked unconscious and I had to rescue him."

      "Sam and I put Bucky's metal arm into a vice before he woke up."

     "Seems familiar," I commented.

     "When he came to, I asked him a lot of questions."

     "I told him what had happened and about the Winter Soldier Program." Bucky paused. "And about you."

     "We decided that we couldn't call Tony since he was in with the Accords," explained Steve.

     "Sam said that he knew a guy. 'A guy' turned out to be ex-con Scott Lang, aka Ant-Man. He can change to the size of an ant with the help of his specialized suit."

      Bucky chimed in, "Pretty sure he can tear himself in half too."

       A picture of a rather average looking man was followed by a much more interesting picture of what appeared to be a specialized suit which was the size of a small insect.

      "Woah!" The wonders of the world never seem to cease.

     "I got in touch with Clint and he agreed to free Wanda from the Compound, recruit Scott, and to join us in our fight," Steve stated.

     "While we were building our team, Tony was building his own. He recruited the Black Panther. And most recently there's this kid from Queens who calls himself 'Spider-Man'. He's young and confused, but has heart."

      "Also strong and sticky," Bucky commented.

     "But who is he?" I asked, looking at the picture of the red and blue clad figure.

      Steve answered, "No one really knows. It's like he has a secret identity or something."

     "We stole a car and met up with Sharon. She gave us back the shield, the suit, and Bucky's backpack. Then we drove to Leipzig-Halle Airport in Schkeuditz, Germany."

     "There was a Quinjet in storage there which we planned to take to Siberia. Clint met us there with Wanda and Scott."

     "They knew we were there somehow and evacuated the airport. We suited up," Steve remembered.

     "I headed towards the chopper Clint got for us, but Tony and Rhodes intercepted me."

     "I tried to explain to them the 'psychiatrist' was really the one behind all of this. I told them about the six other super soldiers and how the 'doctor' was after them."

     "Sorry to interrupt. I'm listening, I promise. Are you going to finish what's on your plate?" I asked, hungrily eyeing what was left of his spaghetti.

     Steve smiled and pushed his plate towards me. "You can have it if you want it."

     "Thanks."

     "If you're still hungry after that, you can make yourself some toast or have some fruit or whatever else you might want," Steve told me.

     I could not believe what I was hearing. "Really?"

     "Really. If you eat everything we have, I can always get more. No need to go hungry."

    I let his words sink into my mind. I do not have to go hungry.

     "After T'Challa and Natasha joined the other two. Spider-Man temporarily stole my shield," Steve continued.

     "Tony said that we had to come in with him now and I told him that was not an option."

     "Sam and Bucky found the Quinjet. I fought T'Challa to keep him away from Bucky. His vibranium claws scarred my shield."

     "Scott shrunk down a fuel truck and then made it big again after we threw it at Rhodes."

     I hesitated. "He can shrink things too?"

     "Yes," Steve confirmed.

      "We all headed to the Quinjet when Vision blocked us with an energy blast and told us to surrender now."

      "Bucky, Sam, Wanda, Barton, and Scott stood with me. Rhodes, Vision, T'Challa, Natasha, and the kid from Queens were with Tony."

      "What about Thor and the Hulk?" I asked.

      "We don't know where they are right now," admitted Steve.

     "So two superheroes are just M.I.A.?"

     "That's not exactly how that works, but we don't know where they are."

     Curious, I asked, "Well, what happened next?"

     Steve sighed. "We all fought with each other. No holds barred."

     "Bucky said that we had to go because the 'doctor' was probably already in Siberia. I was going to cover Buck while he got to the Quinjet, but Sam said for both of us to get to the Quinjet."

     "Why?" I wondered out loud.

     "He said that the rest of the team wasn't getting out of there. Clint agreed with him."

     "They gave themselves up so you could get away?" I faltered.

      Steve nodded. "Scott created a diversion for us by becoming huge."

     "I thought his thing was being small?" I frowned in confusion.

     "Apparently he can do both."

     "So what did you guys do?"

     "We ran for the Quinjet. Vision used an energy blast to collapse the control tower near the hanger, but Wanda used her powers to keep it from falling on us. Then Natasha was waiting for us in the hangar."

     "Oh no," I whispered.

      "She asked us if we were going to stop. I told her that she knew we couldn't. She subdued the Black Panther so we could escape."

      "Wait, she changed sides?!"

      "Yes. Once we were airborne, Tony and Rhodes were on our tail. I think one of their suits must have malfunctioned or something because both of them ended up turning around."

     "We got to the HYDRA base in Siberia, but the 'doctor' had already beaten us there. After we made it inside, we heard someone behind us. Turns out it was Tony."

     I exclaimed, "Tony!? Why the hell was he there?!"

     "That's the trillion dollar question isn't it?" Bucky muttered angrily.

     Steve replied, "He said that maybe my story wasn't so crazy after all."

     "We found the Cryo Chambers and the Super Soldiers were still in them. The 'doctor' had killed all of them. Shot them while they were still in Cryosleep."

     I shuddered just hearing those awful words.

     "The 'doctor' was hiding in a bunker within the base. I asked him why he killed innocent people in Vienna just to bring us here."

     "He said that he had thought of nothing else for over a year and that he had studied and followed me."

     "Not creepy at all," I mumbled.

     "I recognized his accent as Sokovian and asked him if Sokovia was what this was all about," Steve explained.

     "He said that Sokovia was a failed state long before it was blown to hell and that he was here because he made a promise."

     "I asked him if he had lost someone. He said that he had lost everyone and that so would I."

      "He started this tape. It was security footage from December 16, 1991."

      I froze. Something deep down inside me knew that I was connected to this date.

     Bucky appeared to be on the brink of getting sick. Yet Steve still looked to his friend for some form of permission to continue.

     "It showed Tony's parents, Howard and Maria Stark, wrecking their car and then being robbed and killed."

     I whispered, "That's terrible."

     "By the Winter Soldier," Steve finished.

     Two big tears ran down Bucky's face and he turned away from me.

     "Tony moved to attack Bucky, but I held him back. Then Tony asked me if I knew about how his parents died. I told him the truth that I had known."

     "He hit me pretty hard. Then Bucky attacked Tony and I fought against Tony."

     "He put me in leg clamps and tried to fire a rocket into Bucky's face. I got out of those leg clamps real fast after that," Steve remembered, his jaw clenched tight.

     "Bucky was able to push Tony's hand away and the rocket hit one of the huge Cryo Chambers. Tony was pinned momentarily by the debris and I told Bucky to get out of there."

    "I told Tony that what he just saw wasn't Bucky and that HYDRA had control of his mind."

     "Tony tried to fly past me but I caught him by the leg and broke one of his jet boots. He used a laser to trap me in rubble. I was able to get there just in time to block him from blasting Buck at point blank range."

      Steve continued, "I wrapped my grappling hook around his suit's neck. We both fell quite a ways. I threw my shield at him and it fell."

     "Tony got Buck in a chokehold and I jumped onto them. Tony and I fell to the very bottom onto concrete."

     I grimaced at the thought of their hard landing.

     "I told Tony that fighting us wasn't going to change what happened. He said he didn't care because the Winter Soldier killed his mom."

      With sadness in his eyes, Steve recalled, "We both started beating the life out of each other."

     "I grabbed Steve's shield and hit that lump of iron in the back of the head with it," Bucky said in a rasping tone.

     "It was two on one now. Tony didn't like those odds, so he blasted me in the chest. I was out of the fight for about 2 minutes because of that," Steve noted.

     Bucky growled, "I was so fucking mad he hurt Steve. I penned that piece of shit against the wall and would have torn that damn arch reactor out of his dumbass suit if that bastard hadn't blown my arm off first."

     "I saw Bucky with only one arm and then Tony blasted him in the back. Buck flew across the room and got real still. I thought he might be dead," Steve confessed.

     "I was fighting Tony with everything I had. Suddenly, he started blocking my punches and blasted me a couple of times. He was beating me."

     "He told me to stay down and that this was my final warning. I got back up and told him I could do this all day. He was going to blast me in the face when Bucky grabbed one of Tony's feet. And then Tony kicked him in the face."

      "I picked Tony up, suit and all, and threw him down. After mounting him, I beat his head protection off with my shield and killed his arc reactor."

     "I helped Bucky get up and we started limping off. Tony said that the shield didn't belong to me, that I didn't deserve it, and that his father made it," Steve repeated. "All of those statements are true. So I left it there with him."

     Even though I had not known Steve long, I knew he had left behind more than just his beloved shield with Tony that day.

     "That's when Bucky told me that you were still alive. You were kept in a separate room from the others. So the 'doctor' didn't find you and shoot you."

     "We made our way through the rubble and found where you were. I knew we couldn't wake you up safely with Bucky and me in such bad shape. If you were hostile when you woke up, you could have easily killed both of us."

      "We headed back to the Quinjet to come up with a plan when we met T'Challa. He told us that he now knew that he had been after the wrong man."

     "So he changed sides too?" I asked.

      "Yes. I told him about our situation and that you were still trapped inside. Bucky stayed on the Quinjet and T'Challa and I went back inside to get you."

      Steve gently asked, "Do you remember any of that?"

      I shook my head.

      "I didn't think you would."

      "T'Challa had captured Zemo and was taking him to pay for his crimes. I thanked him for everything he had done for us and that was when he mentioned that he had the resources to help both of you and he would be in touch with us."

     "We brought you onto the Quinjet with Bucky and me. Spent the night on board and found this apartment the next day."

     I was ashamed of what happened next, but needed to make sure that my sense of time was right. "And then I woke up and beat up Bucky?"

     "Yes and I sedated you and put you in the vice and you know all the rest."

     "Oh my god! All of this just happened?" I realized. For Steve and Bucky these events had happened mere days ago.

     "Yes," said Steve.

     "What happened to your friends?"

     "They were brought into custody and put in this crazy high security underwater prison. They call it the Raft. Part of this prison is that those on the inside have absolutely no contact with the outside world and they are all serving life sentences without parole."

     Steve insisted, "None of them deserve that. They were only helping me and doing what they believed was right."

     "So what are you going to do about it?" I asked.

     "We are going to break them out."