Zhelaniye

“Steve,” Sam said urgently in Steve’s ear.

At the exact same second, on his right, Wanda stiffened brusquely in her chair.

“Vision’s here,” she breathed, her face bloodless.

Across the rows and rows of conference attendants, on stage, Tony had stepped back and introduced “…my primary colleague and inspiration, ladies and gentleman: the Vision.”

“Aren’t we warded against detection?” Steve whispered.

“It won’t work on him,” she hissed back. “We have to—”

“—go,” Sam was confirming in his ear, “I’ve brought the car around, if you hurry there’s a chance he just won’t notice you—”

Steve was already getting up, keeping his head bowed and his shoulders hunched. The huge hall was packed chock-full—apparently the French were very interested in neurotechnology when Iron Man was the one doing the talking.

Wanda trailed after Steve, and he could feel her energy move around them, tendrils of mental manipulation which discouraged anyone from so much as glancing in their direction. They were slowly making their way across the crowd to the nearest emergency exit, which would bring them right out of the gargantuan Parc des Expositions—but when Sam and Wanda blurted “Shit,” at the same time, Steve began to walk faster, knocking people out of the way.

“You have to go first,” Wanda said when he pulled the door open.

“What? No. I don’t want a repeat of the airport fight.”

She gave him a small, shaky smile. “I don’t plan on fighting him.”

Steve hesitated even though he couldn’t afford to—

“If push comes to shove I will meet you back at the house,” she said, “I can handle myself, just go!”

“MOVE!” Sam shouted at the same time, and Steve cursed and rushed into the bare cement hallway.

It only took him a second to notice steps echoing behind him. Vision wouldn’t have run, and Wanda was right—Vision would not miss an opportunity to talk to her. This had to be—

Steve broke into a full-out run. The exit door was right there. Signs in French warned him that it was alarmed; he didn’t care and slammed it open, launching a deafening siren overhead and throughout the whole building. He was about to slam the door shut behind him when someone shouted, “WAIT!”

He stopped it inches before it closed.

“What are you doing?” Sam hissed in his ear. “What the hell are you doing?”

Steve didn’t answer. He stayed very still, with his hand against the door in case Tony tried to force it open.

Tony did no such thing. When he spoke, his voice had a slight edge of hysteria to it.

“I know we’re not exactly on speaking terms at the moment, but you could at least tell me what’s going on. You wouldn’t be here without a good reason. What is it? HYDRA? AIM? The Ten Rings?”

The siren was still howling inside the building. Steve could visualize Tony's face as clearly as if there had been no door at all between them.

“I was just here for the conference,” he said.

Then he let go and hurried away from the building.

*

“We’re not doing that shit ever again.” Sam was driving angrily into the countryside; the twisty road was narrowing a little more at every turn, but he wasn’t slowing down. “That was too damn close. I knew this was a bad idea from the start.”

Steve didn’t answer; Sam was just venting and probably deserved to do so. It had been very close; they should have probably foreseen Vision's presence.

The risk had been calculated, though. Moving Wanda out of France was problematic—it might stretch her hold on the house’s wards, and they couldn’t afford to lose their shelter. For that same reason, she could not come and go to Wakanda as easily as Steve. It wasn't worth the risk of her going with him until she'd come to a better understanding of brain trauma. They needed to give themselves the best possible odds.

Stark’s conference in Paris was an opportunity they couldn’t afford to miss. Of course, Tony hadn’t been working in this field for very long, but everything he touched turned to gold as usual. As far as Steve could tell, his machine was exactly what Bucky needed. Just his description of it had probably been more helpful to Wanda than months of reading on the subject.

Steve looked up in the rearview mirror. Wanda was in the back seat, with her chin propped up on her hand, looking at the hills.

“Did you get a chance to speak with Vision?” he asked.

She didn’t answer at first. Then, eventually: “We talked.”

“I’m real happy for you guys,” Sam said scathingly. “Oh, by the way, they know we’re in France now. We have to move.”

“They don’t know a thing,” Steve said calmly. “I would’ve crossed an ocean to attend this conference.”

Sam took a deep breath, then exhaled forcefully through his nose. There was a long, painful silence.

“I was the one who told Stark where to find you," he blurted.

Steve turned his head to look at him. This wasn’t what he’d expected at all.

“I said to him, go alone and go as a friend.” Sam hit the wheel. “I’m so goddamn stupid.”

“He did come as a friend. Just didn’t leave as one,” Steve said. He hesitated. “I didn’t realize you felt like that was your fault.”

“That’s because you think everything is only ever your fault.”

Wanda snorted. Steve raised an eyebrow at her in the rearview mirror, then went back to Sam. He felt strange—he wasn’t used to Sam feeling guilty. Sam never messed up. As far as Steve was concerned, he hadn't. But this must have been eating at him, for this to come out now.

“You didn’t do anything wrong,” Steve said. “He was bound to find out about his parents eventually. Hell, we’re lucky this all played out in Siberia where he couldn’t call on his resources.”

Sam swallowed hard and said nothing, but after a while his grip on the wheel relaxed by a fraction. They drove in silence for a little bit.

“I’m sorry, Wanda,” Sam said eventually. He ran a hand over his face, scrubbing hard. “I just got scared.”

“It’s nothing,” she answered lightly.

Steve smiled a little. The good thing about these two was that they never stayed in a bad mood for very long.

After another long moment of pensive staring out the window, Wanda’s eyes found his in the rearview mirror again.

“Do you wish you could mend things with Stark?”

Steve thought of the promises he’d made in his letter. Then he thought back to Siberia and Tony’s cold-blooded, single-minded determination in killing Bucky.

“Only sometimes,” he said.

*

They had to drive for almost the entire day before they were back to the house. It was a great goldenstone farm in a tiny old village, known for its cultivated beauty and its rich, excellent food. T’Challa’s doing, of course. The house was entirely furnished, if a bit out of repair, which was probably calculated so they wouldn’t go stir-crazy. Lots of things to paint and to mend. The gardens were still in full bloom and exhaled a light but heady perfume in the evening air.

It was a little bit like paradise, except for the fact that they were in hiding.

Steve thought again about what Sam had said. You think everything’s your fault. He did have a hard time wrapping his mind around the fact that nobody here blamed him. Not even Clint, who’d left his family behind. Not even Scott, who’d been trying to stay out of trouble after getting out of prison. Not even Sam, who really hadn’t asked for any of this.

Whenever Steve dared to allude to it, he was met with a chorus of Jesus, we’re all adults here, even Scott and It was our decision, you’re not the boss of us.

“So was it all for nothing?” Clint asked Wanda, setting the table while Scott—rather disconcertingly—made the food.

“Not exactly. I heard the first half of Stark’s conference, plus a few others before that,” Wanda answered. Upon a twirl of her fingers, the fat-bellied water jug crossed the room to land onto the table. “I have a lot of material to parse through.”

“They are going to be looking for us starting in France, though,” said Sam uneasily. “Maybe it’s better if you don’t go to Wakanda right away.”

Steve thought about it. Bucky had woken up in January, then in April. It was now the middle of May; the next visit was scheduled for July.

“A bit of caution wouldn’t hurt,” he admitted slowly. “You should come to October’s session.”

“In time for Halloween.” She smiled. “It’ll give me more time to prepare. That’s probably for the best.”

“Kinda ironic to use Stark’s research to help Barnes,” Scott said. When the room fell silent, he looked up from his stirring pan and said, “Was that insensitive? I’m sorry. I went to prison.”

Steve forced a laugh. “No, you’re right. Maybe it’s obscene of me. He invented that thing to cope with his parents’ death, and they died at Bucky’s hands.”

“So what?” Wanda said flatly. “Tony killed my family. Got over it, didn’t I?”

A short silence threatened, but before it could settle in, Scott announced, “Food!” and dropped the heavy pan of pasta on the table.

Everyone reached out and there was a short squabble over who got to help themselves first.

“You know, by the way,” Sam said quietly while everyone reached for bread and cheese and tomatoes, “when that happened, Howard Stark was on his way to the Pentagon with five doses of super-soldier serum in his trunk.”

Steve looked at him.

“We don’t know what he was going to do with it,” he said. “We can’t know.”

“I know. I’m just saying,” Sam said. “If you try to keep tallies, you’re gonna drive yourself mad. Gotta move forwards for a change. Spaghetti?”

T’Challa had said something like that too, Steve thought, watching as Sam piled food onto his plate.

Which reminded him. He got out his phone, angled it for light, then snapped a picture—the spaghetti à la Scott glistening with duck grease and tomato sauce; the torn piece of baguette next to his glass, the mismatched cutlery, the chipped blue-and-white porcelain plate.

Realizing the room had fallen silent, he looked up and blinked. They were all looking at him.

“Steve,” Clint said carefully. “Are you… Instagramming your food?”

Steve felt his cheeks heat up a little. “No. It’s for Bucky.”

They just stared at him some more, and if some emotion flickered on their faces, it was stifled quickly enough when Scott snatched his phone out of his hands.

“Hey!—”

"Selfie," Scott pronounced, and they all drew their chairs back to get up and gather around Steve.

“Guys,” Steve said, but there was a helpless sort of warmth unfolding in his chest. Wanda pressed against him, her hand on his right shoulder; the one on his left was Sam’s. Clint was crowding them from behind so he could be in the picture too, and Scott just mashed himself in front of it all.

“Smile!” he said vibrantly, holding the phone at arm’s length.

Steve took a deep breath, then did as he was told.